Skip to content

Jazz Studies BM -- Program Notes

[In-universe document: Charlie's notes on the Jazz Studies BM program structure. Written for his own reference.]

The Program

Jazz Studies, Bachelor of Music. Four years. 145-149 total credits. The most selective conservatory jazz program in the country -- seven to nine jazz instrumentalists admitted per year across all instruments. Not seven saxophonists. Seven jazz musicians total. Saxophone, trumpet, bass, guitar, drums, piano, voice, vibraphone, flute. You could fit the entire incoming jazz class in a practice room.

Directed by Wynton Marsalis. Chaired by Aaron Flagg. The tradition isn't abstract here -- it walks the hallways.

Year-by-Year Structure

Year 1: Foundation

Private instruction on saxophone (10 cr/year). Jazz Theory I-II. Jazz History I. Ear Training. Jazz Orchestra + Jazz Ensemble from day one. Creative Ideas (the course that runs all four years). Jazz Piano for Non-Pianists. Doubles (flute, with Mark Vinci). Liberal Arts. Discover Juilliard.

22 credits fall, ~19 spring. Heavy.

Year 2: Expansion

Jazz Theory III-IV (Chromatic Harmony, Form). Jazz History II-III. Jazz Improvisation I-II (dedicated improv course starts Year 2). Jazz Piano continues. Ear Training II. Everything from Year 1 ensembles continues.

Faculty review at end of Year 2. The checkpoint. Faculty assess whether you're suitable for program continuation. For a student whose attendance record looks like mine, this is the institutional wall -- the same wall LaGuardia built with academic maintenance, the same wall that says your body's unreliability is indistinguishable from your commitment's unreliability unless someone makes the distinction for you.

Year 3: Specialization

Jazz Arranging and Orchestration. Jazz Composition. Jazz Business I-II (the reality check course -- how does this actually become a career). Jazz Seminar. Classical Music History (From 1700 to 1850 and From 1850 to Present) -- yes, jazz students take classical history too, because the tradition doesn't exist in a vacuum. Liberal arts electives.

Year 4: Culmination

Senior Recital (1 cr). The Jazz Community Project (0 cr, but required). Jazz History IV. Music elective. More liberal arts. Graduation Jury.

The recital is the thing. Everything else has been leading to forty-five minutes on a stage where you show who you've become.

Faculty (Real Juilliard Jazz Faculty -- Names for Reference)

Saxophone: Ron Blake, Dan Block, Bruce Williams Trumpet: Tatum Greenblatt, Christian Jaudes, Joseph Magnarelli Trombone: Jason Jackson, Elliot Mason Guitar: James Chirillo, Doug Wamble Piano: Geoffrey Keezer, Dan Nimmer, Ted Rosenthal Bass: Gerald Cannon, Ben Wolfe Drums: Billy Drummond, Kenny Washington, Paul Wells

Specialized: - Mark Vinci -- Doubles for Saxophonists (flute/clarinet) - Mark Sherman -- Doubles for Drummers - Andy Farber -- Advanced Jazz Composition/Arranging - Marc Cary, Donald Vega -- Jazz Improvisation - Michael Mossman, Sean Smither -- Jazz Theory - Fredara Hadley, Loren Schoenberg, Kenny Washington -- Jazz History - Greg Scholl -- Business of Jazz - Jerome Jennings -- Jazz Orchestra conductor - Carla Cook, Charenee Wade -- Voice

Note: Faculty names are real as of the current Juilliard catalog. Fictionalized names may be assigned for story purposes if needed. Charlie's private saxophone instructor should be established as one specific teacher -- the studio relationship is central to the conservatory experience.

Key Details for Worldbuilding

Class sizes: With 7-9 incoming jazz students per year and roughly 30-35 jazz undergrads total, every jazz class is tiny. Jazz Theory might have 8-10 students. Jazz Ensemble is 5-7. You know everyone. Everyone knows your playing. There's no anonymity.

Shared coursework: Charlie, Peter, and Riley (all freshman jazz, fall 2025) share almost every class. Ezra (sophomore) shares Jazz Orchestra, Jazz Ensemble, and Creative Ideas. Jacob (classical piano) shares almost nothing.

The doubles requirement: Saxophonists study flute and/or clarinet for professional versatility. Big band chairs expect woodwind doublers. Mark Vinci teaches this -- his class is where Charlie picks up flute.

Jazz Piano for Non-Pianists: Two years required. This is NOT piano as an instrument -- it's keyboard harmony, voicings, comping, composition tool. This is why Charlie has a keyboard everywhere he lives. He's not a pianist; he's a composer who learned enough keyboard to think harmonically.

The essay prompt: Fall 2026 application cycle uses a Wynton Marsalis quote from To a Young Jazz Musician about self-knowledge and humility. Charlie's application (fall 2024 cycle for fall 2025 enrollment) would have had a similar essay. For a kid who'd survived a suicide attempt, who'd posted "What It's Really Like Being Me" on YouTube, who'd spent his entire adolescence learning that his body was not what institutions assumed -- the essay about self-knowledge practically writes itself.

The creative project: Callback round requires submitting and discussing a creative project outside your instrument performance -- a poem, drawing, composition, etc. This is Juilliard asking who you are beyond your horn. For Charlie, this could have been a composition, a piece of visual art, or something from his YouTube channel.

Disability accommodations: Available through OASDS (Office of Academic Support and Disability Services). Charlie was undiagnosed at application time, so he had no documentation to request accommodations. He auditioned raw -- no extra time, no rest breaks, no acknowledgment that the body in the audition room was fighting him the entire time.

Audition Format -- Jazz Saxophone BM

Prescreening (4 tunes, recorded):

Category I -- Hymns and Folksongs (vernacular music): - "Just a Closer Walk with Thee" - "Goodnight, Irene" (Huddie Ledbetter) - "Aunt Hagar Blues" (W.C. Handy)

Category II -- Swing Era and American Songbook Standards: - "After You've Gone" (Turner Layton) - "I Remember You" (Victor Schertzinger) - "Like Someone in Love" (Jimmy Van Heusen)

Category III -- Jazz Standards: - "Wail" (Bud Powell) - "In a Capricornian Way" (Woody Shaw) - "This is for Albert" (Wayne Shorter)

Category IV -- The "Spanish" Tinge (Brazilian music): - "Influencia do Jazz" (Carlos Lyra, samba) - "Wave" (Antonio Carlos Jobim, bossa nova)

One tune per category. Melody + single chorus improvisation. Recorded with accompaniment or metronome. Saxophonists can use one selection to demonstrate flute/clarinet doubles.

Live Audition (1st Round):

  1. Perform prescreening selections from memory with professional Juilliard Jazz alumni rhythm section
  2. Be prepared for additional Category II selections
  3. Big band excerpts (sent in advance)
  4. Required etude: "Autumn Leaves (Georgia O'Keeffe)" by Alyssa Morris

Callback (same day, may run until 10 PM):

  1. All 4 prescreening selections again, from memory, with rhythm section
  2. Additional Category II selections as requested
  3. Creative project discussion
  4. May be asked to sight-read and improvise a new composition

Seven to nine spots. The alumni rhythm section plays for every audition. They've heard a hundred versions of "Wave" and they know within four bars whether you understand the music or are just playing the notes.

Charlie's Audition Selections (Fall 2024 cycle, for Fall 2025 enrollment)

  1. Category I (Hymns/Folksongs): "Just a Closer Walk with Thee" -- the prayer. A gospel spiritual about asking to be walked through suffering, played by a boy who'd tried to die the year before. The melody alone told the faculty something before he improvised a single note.

  2. Category II (Swing/Songbook): "Like Someone in Love" (Jimmy Van Heusen) -- channeling Coltrane's version. Tender, intimate, requiring breath control and phrasing maturity beyond most seventeen-year-olds. The ballad showed he could be gentle.

  3. Category III (Jazz Standards): "Wail" (Bud Powell) -- bebop at 240 BPM. The most physically demanding choice in the category. Brave or reckless or both. He burned everything he had on this one.

  4. Category IV (Spanish Tinge): "Wave" (Antonio Carlos Jobim) -- bossa nova. The cooldown after the fury. Breath-focused, gentle, the body getting to rest while the music stayed beautiful. The first deployment of what would become Charlie's CRATB performance strategy: fire, then rest. Program the set so the intensity and the recovery serve each other.

Required etude: "Autumn Leaves (Georgia O'Keeffe)" by Alyssa Morris.

Callback creative project: A clip from his YouTube channel -- likely the "What It's Really Like Being Me" video or related content. When the faculty asked who he was beyond the horn, Charlie handed them a video of himself being publicly, unfilteredly vulnerable about living in a failing body. Most applicants submit polished creative projects. Charlie submitted the truth.

The full arc -- prayer, tenderness, fury, peace -- was the audition of a musician who already understood that a set tells a story. The alumni rhythm section would have felt the shift between "Wail" and "Wave" and known they were playing with someone who thought architecturally about music, not just technically.

Connection to Later Legendary Performances

The "Wail" into "Wave" sequence at the audition was the embryonic version of a performance strategy that would define Charlie's career. In CRATB, Charlie became legendary for two drum performances -- "Ran Kan Kan" (Tito Puente's mambo, the Nuyorican heritage piece) and "Caravan" (Duke Ellington/Juan Tizol, the jazz tradition piece -- Tizol was also Puerto Rican). Both demanded explosive, sustained physical intensity that his body increasingly couldn't provide. It was widely expected at CRATB shows that Charlie would either pass out after "Caravan" or be helped off stage to recover, and the rest of the band would close out the set. Charlie programmed the setlists around this reality -- fire and rest, the same architecture he showed the Juilliard faculty at seventeen.

He named his first drum pad "Tito" after Tito Puente at age fifteen. Puente was also from New York, also Puerto Rican, and also studied at Juilliard. The lineage is a straight line from a kid in Jackson Heights to the king of Latin percussion to the stage where Charlie played "Ran Kan Kan" hard enough that someone had to carry him off it.

Charlie's last full "Caravan" performance came at approximately age 37, when his chronic conditions made the sustained physical demands unsustainable. The event is documented in Charlie Rivera Last Caravan Performance - Event. A "Ran Kan Kan" final performance event file has not yet been created.