There's nothing out there like the UC Irvine music program. And now that a new MFA emphasis in “Integrated Composition, Improvisation and Technology” has been announced for Fall 2008, it's no wonder that the school trains and raises only the most brilliant of musicians. The UCI Jazz Orchestra is the premier big band of the jazz program-and it shows: Their quarterly concerts more often than not sell out. The Orchestra is dedicated to bringing the (willing) masses the music of the greatest composers and arrangers of big band music-and that includes the contemporary greats, as well. If you ask us, UC Irvine's still Orange County's claim to fame: Nobel Prize winning professors, world-famous alumni, there's even a couple buildings on campus designed by notable architects like Frank Gehry. And stop calling it the OC. You're not helping.
Tue., March 4, 8 p.m., 2008
