Tucson teen to debut jazz big band at Century Club

"He spends a majority of his life with music, I mean, probably 10 hours a day," said Scott Black, the co-director of Tucson Jazz Institute, where the 17-year-old Estrada has spent the past three years as one of TJI's Ellington Big Band top trumpeters. "He's extremely talented, and he works really hard."

At Sunnyside High School, where Estrada just finished his junior year, band teacher Christian Del Rosario echoes Black.

"He has been working hard to not only improve himself as a musician, but to also get those around him better as well," Del Rosario said in an email interview, recounting how Estrada, as section lead for the trumpets, arranged for extra practice time "to make his section sound as unified as possible."

"It wasn't mandatory to hold extra time for practices, but he did with his section so that they could all perform their best throughout the year," Del Rosario said.

It didn't surprise him when Estrada told his teacher he wanted to put together a big band in the tradition of Duke Ellington.

"Him having his own jazz orchestra has been a dream of his," Del Rosario added.

On Monday, Estrada's dream is coming true when he introduces the Daniel Estrada Orchestra at The Century Room at Hotel Congress. 

Del Rosario, who plays trombone, is among the 15 musicians Estrada has tapped to be part of the orchestra. Estrada will play solo trumpet, one of five trumpet players in the group that also includes four saxophonists, a trio of trombone players and a rhythm section with piano, drum and bass.

Monday's debut is the first stop in what Estrada hopes will be a lifelong career as a band leader and composer.

"You know, Duke Ellington started his orchestra at 17 and he led it for the rest of his life," Estrada said. "And that's what I plan to do. This is what I love. I could never see myself not doing this."

That wasn't the case when Estrada took up his first instrument, the trombone, in sixth grade.

"I wasn't really super into music at first when I started out," he said. "Trombone was a difficult instrument for me, since I had never played any instruments before."

When he switched to drums around seventh or eighth grade, "it kind of just clicked in my mind," he said. "I really started to like music. I really enjoyed it and especially jazz."

He was playing drums when he joined the Tucson Jazz Institute three years ago before switching to trumpet.

Black and TJI cofounder/owner Brice Winston introduced Estrada to the music of Ellington, Count Basie, Thad Jones and Dizzy Gillespie, but more than that, they exposed him to the stories behind the music, which Estrada said made the biggest impact, particularly Ellington's composing.

"His music just speaks to me in a really personal way," Estrada said. "A lot of things he writes about, I feel kind of connected to them because that's the way I look at the world sometimes. Really like analyzing things, looking deeper, finding meaning in things, in feelings and people and words, phrases."

Estrada started writing his own music several years ago, largely influenced by Ellington's styles and "the way he came about writing in the 1950s and the '60s and the '70s." He and his orchestra will perform 11 of his original works at Monday's concert. 

"I really got interested in the idea of writing my own music, creating my own sounds with having all the people in mind, like Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Thad Jones," he said, adding that his music has references to Ellington, but "it's more personal, more put together, because it means something to me."

Estrada starts the process with a piano and trumpet, and once he finds "ideas I like, I try to fit them into a nice sort of melody that fits the style or fits the mood I'm trying to go for," he said.

Estrada said he also follows Ellington's lead of writing for the entire orchestra. A pianist, Ellington rarely played on his recordings, instead focusing his attention on the orchestra.

"His real instrument is the band, all the people in his band that he put together," Estrada said, "He gives every single person a really personal note and he makes them hold on to it and play with such an importance that everyone has the same level of importance to create something just really beautiful."

In addition to Del Rosario and Estrada, the Daniel Estrada Orchestra features former and current members of Tucson Jazz Institute and its award-winning Ellington Big Band including Theo Partain on alto sax; David Nguyen and TJI faculty member Joseph Rader on tenor sax; baritone sax player Jaxon Hirsh; trumpet players Jibrael Alsooz, Kaleb White, Milo Fox and Jose Trujillo; Joshua Parker and Aidan Schofield on trombone; and the rhythm section comprised of pianist Leo Stealey-Euchner, bass player Zeke Hirsh and Zayden Morgan on drums.

The orchestra will perform two shows on Monday, at 6:30 and 8 p.m., at The Century Room, 311 E. Congress St. Tickets are $19.06, or $12.36 for students, at hotelcongress.com.