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The UNLV School of Music Division of Jazz Studies hosts the Essentially Ellington Regional High School Jazz Band Festival Jan. 31-Feb.1 in Artemus Ham Concert Hall. Essentially Ellington co-produces noncompetitive, education-focused festivals designed to offer high school jazz bands of all levels the opportunity to perform the music of Duke Ellington and other seminal big band composers and arrangers. Participating bands receive professional feedback from clinicians and other jazz professionals in their own backyard. 

The festival is sponsored by Jazz at Lincoln Center, the Jazz Outreach Initiative, UNLV, and Thomas Bridge.

Las Vegas-native Kenny Rampton — acclaimed trumpeter and member of the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra directed by Wynton Marsalis — is artistic director for the festival.

Jazz at Lincoln Center artists Jerome Jennings, Julius Tolentino, and Christopher Dorsey along with vocalists Don Cunningham and Michelle Johnson and tap dancer Aaron Turner are performing at 7 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 1, in Ham Hall with the DownBeat Magazine award-winning UNLV Jazz Ensemble I, directed by Dave Loeb along with Kenny Rampton, legendary jazz drummer Butch Miles and the Las Vegas Master Singers.

General admission tickets are $10, seniors and military with ID are $8 and available at  or by calling 702-895-ARTS (2787). CCSD, UNLV, and CSN and participating students are free with ID.