The Berkeley High School Jazz Program is one of the finest in the country, nationally and internationally known as an incubator of talent and a citadel of swing. The Berkeley High Jazz Ensemble is its flagship performing group and has been recognized as one of the nation’s leading high school big bands for the past 40 years. Some of the world’s great jazz artists have come through the Berkeley High jazz program, and two outstanding alumni will be sitting in with the band tonight, the eminent saxophonist Dave Ellis and Erik Jekabson on trumpet and flugelhorn. This is the kind of collaboration that education – and musical magic – are all about!