In Evanston, along with warmer weather comes lively tunes. Each Sunday, a group of jazz musicians heads out to Fountain Square with melodies in hand.
From May to July, Downtown Evanston hosts a weekly two-hour “Sunday Jazz at the Square” session, where young jazz musicians share their talent with the community. This year, performances started May 17 and will end July 26.
Skokie resident and Berklee College of Music student Zach Sorkin founded the event. He said he has been playing the drums at Fountain Square during the summer for the past few years.
“We would just come here, set up and play,” Sorkin said. “The second year we did it, somebody from the city saw us and was like, ‘Hey, we’d love to schedule it and have you here every week.’”
Sorkin gathers a trio or quartet to play weekly. He said they normally draw a large crowd. This year, Sorkin said he is inviting more experienced guest musicians to play alongside them.
Pianist and Bienen junior Brandon Harper said he has been playing jazz “pretty much (his) whole life,” and he enjoys collaborating with older performers.
“It’ll be great for us, as musicians, to be working with these really high-level musicians that we aspire to be,” Harper said.
Still, he said it is nice to play with people his own age as they continue to learn from one another.
Evanston resident Michelle Novak was one of many who attended the event Sunday.
“It’s beautiful to be able to sit outside, enjoy nature and also listen to wonderful music,” Novak said. “I think something that’s really wonderful that Evanston does is bringing community together.”
On Sunday, dozens of people filled the tables in Fountain Square to listen to the musicians’ spontaneity.
Sorkin said he was surprised to see so many people come out to listen to what he said is normally seen as “background music.”
“We would draw a lot bigger crowds than we thought,” he said. “There’s something we really thought was really beautiful, just like ordinary people who like jazz.”
Without specific songs in mind, Sorkin said his group is just “coming here and calling tunes.”
He said jazz musicians share a language called jazz standards that helps them stay in harmony.
“It’s something we can kind of do spontaneously,” he said. “We all can be speaking that language together.”
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