Terell Stafford imparted a magnanimous mindset among the students in the Temple University Jazz Band heading into the 2026 National Collegiate Jazz Championship in New York last weekend. “I always say to them: Just remember, ‘competition’ should be crossed out,” he explained on a recent episode of The Late Set. “It should be ‘community.’ We should go there to meet people and support people and show love. And if you happen to win, great. If you lose, you still won, ‘cause you’re there.”
Winning was in the cards this year: the Temple University Jazz Band took first place in the two-day invitational competition, organized by Jazz at Lincoln Center at Frederick P. Rose Hall. The award comes with a $10,000 prize, and no small measure of prestige. (Second place, and $7,500, went to Michigan State University. Third place, and $5,000, went to Huston-Tillotson University from Austin, TX. A total of 10 bands competed.)
In addition to the top placing bands, awards for section and individual performance were presented by Todd Stoll, Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Vice President of Education, and Maegan Kelly, the organization’s Senior Director of Student & Family Programs. Temple won both Outstanding Rhythm Section and Outstanding Trumpet Section, as well as the award for Outstanding Combo Performance.
Receiving commendations on their instruments were trumpeters Jesse Deems and Levi Rozek; clarinetists Zach Spondike and Sam Chung; vocalist Jacquee Paul; alto saxophonist Ray Kaneko; tenor saxophonist Kiara Rouse; pianist Anthony Aldissi; and drummer Mekhi Boone, the subject of a WRTI Young Artist Spotlight last year.
Finally, the Harry Carney Good Citizen of Jazz Award went to Zach Spondike, a member of Temple’s saxophone section, who stepped in unexpectedly as a sub for one of the other competing bands. And the Earl Hines Outstanding Musician Award was bestowed on two individuals — notably Graham Kozak, the bassist in the band.
“I was very surprised by it, because I didn’t know it was a thing,” Kozak, a second-year masters student at Temple’s Boyer College of Music and Dance, tells WRTI. “That was towards the end of the awards, so I thought it was going to go right into the placement of the bands. I was just sitting in my chair, and Wynton called my name. I was honestly shocked. Terell was sitting in front of me. I stood up and asked, ‘Do I go up and shake his hand?’ I didn’t know what to do. It was kind of surreal, honestly, and so cool.”
The awards were adjudicated by a panel of noted jazz musicians and educators, including trumpeter Wynton Marsalis, the Managing and Artistic Director Jazz at Lincoln Center; trumpeters Kenny Rampton and Bruce Harris; trombonists Chris Crenshaw, Elliot Mason and Francisco Torres; saxophonists Sherman Irby, Chris Lewis and Alexa Tarantino; pianist Helen Sung; and drummer Jeff Hamilton.
The Temple Jazz Band performed three songs in the competition, and each was also featured in the ensemble’s winter concert. WRTI is proud to share recordings of those selections here, recorded by David Pasbrig and mixed by our own Robert Webb.
“Windows” (Chick Corea, arr. Ted Nash)
A piece in waltz time that Chick Corea first recorded in 1966, “Windows” has been characterized by the music theorist Steven Strunk as “an interesting study in tonal and harmonic ambiguity.” This arrangement, by Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra alum and new Boyer faculty member Ted Nash, takes full advantage of the tonal colors available to a big band (including saxophonists doubling on flutes).
“I Got It Bad (And That Ain’t Good)” (Duke Ellington)
First published in 1941, this lovelorn ballad (with lyrics by Paul Francis Webster) was first sung in the stage revue Jump for Joy by Ivie Anderson, who subsequently recorded the song. Temple’s arrangement is inspired by a version on the 1957 album Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Duke Ellington Songbook; Jacquee Paul is the vocalist, and Kiara Rouse plays the Ben Webster-esque tenor saxophone solo.
“Second Line” (Duke Ellington)
A key movement in Duke Ellington’s New Orleans Suite, which was commissioned for the inaugural New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival in 1970, “Second Line” celebrates the spirit of that city’s joyous musical traditions. The clarinet is a central voice in the piece, and in this recording, Sam Chung takes the lead. There’s also a ringer in the band: guest trombonist Wycliffe Gordon, an authority in the tailgate style.
In addition to its latest honors, the Temple University Jazz Band is about to release a noteworthy album: Live From Japan, Volume I, recorded in Hitotsubashi Hall on the university’s Japan campus during spring break 2025. That album, like the recordings above, underscore the exceptional camaraderie among the musicians in the band.
“We’re so closely connected not only musically but outside of music as well,” Kozak attests. “We’ll have these group hangouts with everybody in the band, 18 or 19 of us.”
Regarding Stafford’s exhortation to the band — his emphasis on community, rather than competitiveness — Kozak was quick to agree. “He’s instilled that into us,” he says. “When we went up to the competition, we in the band were all in the same headspace, the same mentality. I feel like the band wasn’t really nervous to play. We’ve all got each other’s backs, and I feel like that definitely permeated. I was backstage telling the rhythm section: ‘Look, guys, let’s play. As long as we put our best foot forward and play as best we can — after that, whatever happens, happens.’”
