Rita On The Road Episode 2 - Help of Southern Nevada; Dave Loeb, UNLV Music Dept.; Las Vegas Jazz Society (November 27, 2022)

Part 1 Abby Quinn - Help of Southern Nevada 

Part 2 Dave Loeb - UNLV Music Dept. with student Eddy Sarabia

Part 3 Judy Tarte and Ryan Baker - Las Vegas Jazz Society Theme Music Ted Howe, Composer

Engineer: Wesley Knight

What is Rita On The Road?

An audio magazine sharing compelling stories from the people who are the life-blood of Las Vegas.

Unknown Speaker 0:05
Broadcasting from the entertainment capital of the world in Las Vegas at 91.5k. You in the jazz and more. This is Rita on the road. I'm your hopes to read a part two. Part one, we'll be speaking with Abby Quinn from the HELP of Southern Nevada, part two, we'll head over to the k, u and v performance studio and talk to UNLV Professor Dave Loeb, and part three, we'll travel over to the bootlegger Bistro, and speak to Judy tart and Ryan Baker, from the Las Vegas jazz society. And now, part one. In the studio today, we have Abby Quinn, the chief Community Relations Officer of HELP of Southern Nevada. Welcome.

Unknown Speaker 0:52
Thank you. Thank you for having me today.

Unknown Speaker 0:54
Well, having you here today was something on my heart because you deal with the homeless population. And that is something that we're seeing across the our nation, it is a growing growing concern. And what I'm looking for is to learn more about HELP of Southern Nevada, and what is your mission? And what type of resources can you offer to the homeless population,

Unknown Speaker 1:24
help us Southern Nevada has been in our community for over 52 years. We're a social service agency. And our main focus is absolutely homelessness, our mission and our goal, really, our goal is to end homelessness for one individual, one family and one youth at a time. And since the pandemic, we definitely have seen as many cities and states across the country, an influx in homelessness, I would say the largest growing population for us that we see at HELP of Southern Nevada is going to be our families and our youth. And we're kind of a one stop shop, we try and wrap around as many services as we can with our clients so that when they get to us, and they're homeless, and they need housing, we're thinking about all components. Because when we exit the picture, we want to make sure that our clients are self sufficient, they're definitely going to hit another bump in the road, something might happen. But if we give them the proper tools, we're able to know that with the tools that we've given them, that they can keep that self sufficiency and not fly back into homelessness.

Unknown Speaker 2:29
Right. And this is such a complex issue. You know, people think sometimes, oh, that homeless person, or they're just lazy, or they did this or that, let's, let's really break this down. And and see, because my sense is and I and there's probably studies that have been done on this, you know, actually tracking, like you said, different families, individuals, but it's such a complex situation. So let's, let's break it down.

Unknown Speaker 2:58
Absolutely. Housing is a human right. And that's what we believe in helping Southern Nevada and all of our staff and our board. And our volunteers and our donors believe that same thing. It's a human right, everyone deserves to be housed that stereotype of people being lazy, or they gambled away their money, different things like that. Those are very old stereotypes. That is absolutely not who we serve, is it a small population of people that really just want to live independently, they don't want anyone looking over them or watching over them, of course, and there are also a percentage of our clients who want to stay on the streets, that's where they feel the most comfortable or for whatever reason, there will be people that don't want to be housed. But the majority of people have lived paycheck to paycheck, and they had some large incident in their life, many the pandemic, or possibly medical bills for their children.

Unknown Speaker 3:52
Exactly. That's what I was going to say, that's where, you know, you're just getting by, you don't really have a huge savings as a cushion. But then bam, something happens. And then you get this, this extraordinary medical bill, and it just sends the family into a tailspin. So

Unknown Speaker 4:13
listeners, and I do want to be very clear, our clients absolutely would love to save money. But there's just there's if you're not making a living wage, and you're paying 50 and 60% of your income is going to rent, it's very difficult to save. So it's not as if our clients are not educated on financial literacy or different things like that. If they just don't have the money to do that. They don't have the ability to keep that windfall in case something happens.

Unknown Speaker 4:41
Well, let's give out since you are a resource based, let's give a website those something that's easy to remember. And we'll give it again, probably several times just to reinforce it. But what is the website that someone could who's listening today could reach you guys

Unknown Speaker 4:58
it's www DoD help. So nv.org, you can Google us, it'll come up, but help SOS v.org. And you'll be able to go to our website, we have a get help or give help section. If you're in need of the assistance, it's very clear and very direct what to do. If you see people that are homeless on the streets, refer them to us refer them to our website. But that's, that's definitely the easiest way to get some information. And to email the info line, which is info at help slnb.org.

Unknown Speaker 5:31
Now, you just brought up a good point about if you're, if our one of our listeners is thinking, Oh, let's see, maybe I can give some help. There was a group that I was familiar with over when I lived in Southern California, that was a women's group and we would put together like little care packages and and have them in our car. So if you're stopped at an intersection, you could the little gift bag would include maybe a couple of granola bars. There was one group that I was familiar with, they put a $5 bill in there, and then just and maybe some toiletries, do you find is that helpful? Or is it you know, because sometimes you don't know it rolling down your window and handing something out to someone on a street corner share

Unknown Speaker 6:16
is that helpful, sometimes it's very hard to determine if that person is just paying handling, or if they're legitimately homeless. So what I tell my friends and family is, if you want to give someone money, and you don't care where it's going, and you're okay, if they're doing whatever they want with it, then give them the money. But if you truly want to help our homeless population, you can connect yourself with a group or a nonprofit that has the ability to outreach to those clients. So help us Southern Nevada, we have outreach teams that go out into the encampments, the tunnels, all of the places not meant for human habitation, and we deliver those services. So during the summer, we could use assistance for water bottles. So we bring out water every single day, that saves a life, we will be making winter kits here in the next couple of days. Those winter kits include beanies, just scarves, the hot hands to keep them warm, the emergency blankets, things like that. So if you can align yourself with a nonprofit that actually will be giving those out to the clients, what that does is two things, it helps us with our budget. And so we don't have to purchase those items. And we can use that money for other programs, or for actual assistance. And it also allows us to maintain those relationships with our homeless clients that are still on the streets. Because right now housing is very difficult to get. Even when we identify people, we don't have the units to put people in. So those people might be living on the streets for a couple of months until we can get them into housing. So that allows us to go out and just continuously check in and make sure everyone's doing all right. And they'd extend that olive branch, hey, we're here to help you, we're bringing you these items. Let's get into some housing, let's get you some services.

Unknown Speaker 7:59
I'm so glad that you mentioned that. And my sense is that there are probably several categories. We've already mentioned, one, where there's been a crisis in like, well with what we went through with a pandemic, or maybe a major medical expense, or whatever the expenditure is. But then there's another category of people that might be dealing with mental illness, and then to get into housing, that's going to be challenging, because they may not be able to properly mat manage that, what that entails, you know, paying your rent, utilities, or whatever that might be. So could you in our time, I know there's so many aspects of this that we could talk about. But if you could address that to it, is there a way to help those that are experiencing the mental

Unknown Speaker 8:47
Yes, shoe SATs. So a lot of our clients are going to be co occurring. So they have mental health and substance abuse, the Substance Abuse comes because they're self medicating. They're not on the proper medication for their mental health. Again, we are Housing First. So what that means is, it doesn't matter where you come to us or what you come to us with. We want to get you into housing, once we stabilized your housing, we have intensive case managers that will work on that mental health, they'll work on that substance abuse, we wrap those services around you and we make sure that those clients are okay. We assist with rent, we make sure you get help with employment, we have a workforce services department, it like I said it's at one stop shop. We just want to get you into housing so we can give all of those services to you at that point.

Unknown Speaker 9:29
Well as our time is kind of escaping us now. Is there any added thought that you'd like to put on and definitely give that website information one more time, please.

Unknown Speaker 9:39
Right. So I think what I just want to get out is that it's very important that we recognize everyone deserves to have a home to live in. And wait you're not defined by your past. Let's work on your future. So please, if you know anyone who needs help, if you need help yourself, do not hesitate to come to help us Southern Nevada. The best way is to go to our website help so nv.org or to email us at info at help slnb.org We have someone who answers all of those emails personally. So please reach out do not stay where you are because of pride or because you, you're you're nervous that we can help we will figure out how to get you housed and how to begin your new life, your new chapter.

Unknown Speaker 10:17
Thank you. You've been listening to Abby Quinn, Chief Community Relations Officer from HELP of Southern Nevada. Thank you. Thank you. And now part two, let's head over to the KU envy performance studio. This is so cool. This is Rita on the road. And in the KU envy studios, we have none other than UNLV Dave Lowe, along with Eddie playing on the tenor sax. Guys, guys, you sound fantastic. Well, folks, while they're setting their instruments down and going to make their way over to the microphones, we're going to hear all the details of what's going on currently in the UNLV music department. Guys, you sounded fantastic. Thank you. Thank you for coming on over here to the KU in the studios of right Dave lobe. He is the director coordinator division of jazz and commercial music along with a ton of other things. If you ever read this man's bio, and all the people you've worked with, I know you're very humble. But I'm I've always been a big fan of Nancy Wilson and you could just go on well yeah named drop a little bit who well, you've performed and thank you.

Unknown Speaker 12:14
Yeah, Nancy Wilson was honored to get to work with her. The Hollywood boy was the pianist there for 10 years and she came in on that one and then I also play for on a show called The Real and real meaning of Christmas on Fox was doing a show called In Living Color working on behind the scenes and coming up with the music for a lot of the skits and everything and then they were also doing the show this gospel special. And she came in and sang I think was a little town of Bethlehem with mom with the BB and CC wine. It's anyway, she was just lovely what it was I was what an honor.

Unknown Speaker 12:45
And the list goes on and on. You have worked with so many people please introduce Edie to our our listeners as well.

Unknown Speaker 12:51
Well, this is one of our very fine students in the UniFi school of music division of jazz and commercial music Edie serrania. And he is saxophonist with our award winning Jazz Ensemble one and also with our Joe Williams scholarship, jazz combo, which is we receive scholarships in the name of the great late Joe Williams, who passed away several years ago and lived in Vegas, but he's a member of that combo. And that combo is going to be performing at the jazz education network international conference in Orlando this upcoming January. I think it's on January 7, and they've been chosen among the universities worldwide as one of the top small jazz like a chamber group. And Eddie's a fantastic saxophonist, and he plays flute and all the instruments in the woodwinds. And also, he's from Hamilton High School and California in Los Angeles area, which is a another high school that is that we've had many other students from there, one of them out of wheeling is now the who did his masters with his UNLV. He's the pianist and musical director for Donnie Osman and also for the Raiders band with these names

Unknown Speaker 14:03
you can drop names all day long at that the whole purpose of this segment having you here in the studio is an auditory pat on the back for all you're doing and and Eddie, are you looking forward to January but what do you think's gonna happen? Yeah,

Unknown Speaker 14:18
of course, just really grateful to be part of the program. We were actually there last year with with a different ensemble and Jazz Ensemble was performing at last year's Gen. And we got to meet so many incredible artists to flourish Sean Jones, having FaceTime with with all these people that are pioneers in our art is going to be really incredible.

Unknown Speaker 14:36
And congratulations on being a recipient of the Joe Williams scholarship. And what year are you in your your music program here at UNLV?

Unknown Speaker 14:44
I'm in my fourth year, right? Oh,

Unknown Speaker 14:46
he's gonna graduate and go away, maybe. But you'll come back and help out right.

Unknown Speaker 14:51
I've learned so much very, very grateful to the program. Incredible lineage. Again, I'm from Hamilton, a lot of other alumni from you know, you're actually from that school. So, yeah, just happy to be here.

Unknown Speaker 15:02
Well, there's something else, as I mentioned about an auditory pat on the back, and it's well deserved because you are so busy with this program, Dave, and just all these talented students, but I know there's something coming up when anybody mentions, Grammy, Grammy. So please fill our listeners and what is happening for the department now and your students?

Unknown Speaker 15:23
Well, we are so excited. And there are many faculty and students that have been part of this. But our recent CD almost there has been entered in the Grammys and has gotten to the first round for Grammy consideration. Wow. And it's a two CD set. And it's almost all of our student groups are included. So they're all they all contributed to this incredible honor. And also one of our students, Ricardo Rana, who wrote the title song received a consideration grim consideration for his original piece. We have faculty, Carlos Motta Alvarez, who has some video game music he's written that's gotten Grammy consideration. Dr. Jennifer Beller is one of her pieces that's considered an Professor Adam Schroeder, who's in our jazz division was considered for one of his incredible Instrumental Jazz solos in that category. So we're pretty well represented well, in this first round of the Grammys. So we're excited. Well, I'd

Unknown Speaker 16:29
like to let our listeners know how can they How can we get this? I'm holding the CD in my hands here, but how can we get it into the hands of our listeners? Where can they find this?

Unknown Speaker 16:39
Well, the listeners can obtain this CD from on Spotify, Apple, Amazon, and also Bandcamp on various venues, and also on Vegas records.com, which is locally here in Vegas.

Unknown Speaker 16:54
Fantastic. And coming up in December, and January. You've already mentioned how you're going to be going to Florida. Anything else that we can mention that our listeners can catch during December, January? What

Unknown Speaker 17:09
do you think? Yes, we have our fall Jazz Festival and it's November 28 Jazz Ensemble, three jazz vocal ensembles jazz guitar ensemble, and the next day, Tuesday, the 29th of November, Latin and contemporary jazz ensembles. And on the 30th of November, the Wednesday night jazz ensembles, one and two all those performances are at UNLV in the black box theater. The concerts are at 730 and you can find out ticketing information from the PAC box office.

Unknown Speaker 17:36
That is wonderful. Well, I you know, our time is kind of escaping us. But I'd like to get your perspective over the years. Because you've you've been with the UNLV system for quite quite a while for prospective students considering going in for a career in music. What can you say for a future career in this field because it's not easy, not easy being a musician and marketing yourself and the highs and lows of career like this. So what advice

Unknown Speaker 18:05
can be very challenging, but I have to say that we have a very good record of student and alumni that are performing successfully all over Las Vegas and all around the world. I mean, Kenny Rampton zelalem He's with the Jazz at Lincoln Center orchestra with with with Marcellus like I said earlier, the auto healing and his the boss for that the braiders band is David preco. He's graduated from our program we have Willie Geist, indoor for who in right The list goes on, but our students are obtaining wonderful employment as professional musicians and as educators at major universities like LSU, one of our students, Molly Redfield just received assistant professor there so she was hired and another Robert Shipley at Hope College in Michigan. And I could go on and on but there the placement is incredible the students and in both the professional world and as educators,

Unknown Speaker 18:59
well, for future students thinking about signing up here at UNLV, you would just gain a wealth of knowledge and experience and hey, you could be on the next CD here for Grammy consideration, Dave, anything else you want to add or Eddie that you want to add on before we our time is fleeting,

Unknown Speaker 19:23
want to say very grateful to Julian foundation for for I mean, there's a reason why I have the opportunity to be here. Also, to the incredible faculty at this university. It's the more I go around town. The more I see people that I have connections with through my professors through people I know. So yeah, just very grateful to the program and happy to be here.

Unknown Speaker 19:45
And I forgot one of the I didn't forget but one of the dates is December 14 at the Clark County Library. Our jazz vocal ensembles are performing and Laura Smith's been doing a great job along with Joe Bell, Nellie her faculty who she teaches them the art of scat singing. And she puts together Laura puts together the ensembles. And that's another free concert on December 14 Wednesday night at the Clark County Library.

Unknown Speaker 20:08
She lots to do here in town. Dave Lowe, thank you so much for coming in. And Eddie, you guys sounded fantastic thank you. 91.5 Jazz and more. This is Rita on the road. And here I am at the bootleggers bistro I've caught up with Judy tart, who is the president of the Las Vegas jazz society, and board member and singer extraordinaire, Ryan Baker. Hi, you guys.

Unknown Speaker 21:06
I'm glad you're here.

Unknown Speaker 21:07
Oh, my pleasure, will tell us about a little bit of the history of the Las Vegas jazz society.

Unknown Speaker 21:14
Well, The Last Vegas jazz society was organized in the 70s 1975 by Mark Montgomery, one of the Montgomery brothers. And he was playing here in the city and knew that there were a lot of people that liked jazz, and that like playing jazz, but weren't getting the opportunity. So he set up the jazz society just for that reason. So people could play and people could hear. That is

Unknown Speaker 21:43
wonderful. And tell us a little bit more about what will what do you do in the Las Vegas jazz society? What are the benefits of becoming a member? Can you speak to that, Ryan?

Unknown Speaker 21:55
Well, you know what we do here, this group is kind of threefold. It's sort of what we're at bootlegger here, we just had a great musical event with a great band, we put out events like this periodically throughout the year and sponsor some other ones. We also do some educational programs, with the schools in the local area, younger, younger musicians next generation. And we're in general, just promoting this music in the community, the broader community here in Las Vegas. So I mean, you know, becoming a member, you get to be a part of that you get to support that. There are there are ways you can you can give them your time and be involved in in in the different things like I talked about, like the different groups that do those various functions, that he also, you know, there's just counties events and things like that. But really, it's just being part of it. And it's a kind of a community of people that have like minded who support this music and want to promote it.

Unknown Speaker 22:48
Exactly. Because this is a genre of music, that we don't want it to disappear. Jazz is so part of our history here. So how long have you been involved? Judy? And you're the president of the organization? That is awesome.

Unknown Speaker 23:03
Yes. Well, I am I February, then it's more like coordinating people than the title might explain. But yes, I have been involved since 1975. Because I was on that first board with Manuel Comrie. I was five at the time of course. But, and I have pretty much been part of the jazz society off and on mostly on since that time.

Unknown Speaker 23:32
Well, you've mentioned about being on the board. Well, I'm going to share with our listeners that I am so honored to now have been elected appointed. I'm going to it's my honor to serve on the board of the Las Vegas jazz society. And what are your expectations for this upcoming year of 2023? What do you hope to accomplish?

Unknown Speaker 23:59
Well, we hope to continue these concerts that Ryan was speaking of. We have the Sunday jazz series going in it's once a month where you're hoping to experiment math, maybe with cabaret chats at the later time rather than in the mornings or early afternoon. And we sponsor community events such as the annual traves picnic, we just had the 44th I think it was jazz picnic, and we Howard is sponsoring a community jazz program called jazz artists, arts and it's a it says community band for those people who are some playing professionally, but some who just want to hone their skills again, and it's a workshop kind of situation and that means Wednesdays from 630 to seven, three years, something like that. I don't know they could Find out on our website.

Unknown Speaker 25:01
Speaking of website, let's offer the website so people can follow up.

Unknown Speaker 25:07
That's LV js.org is where they people can find out. Yeah, all these kinds of things.

Unknown Speaker 25:14
And if you're a member of the just jazz society, we have a team that will call people that are members and let them know what the events are, what upcoming events are going on and so on.

Unknown Speaker 25:29
So speaking of upcoming events, let's give a plug because I know you've got something coming up December in December December 4. Yeah, what would that be?

Unknown Speaker 25:39
Yes, we're gonna actually be right here at the bootlegger we're gonna have another the Sunday jazz events with Ronnie roses quartet. And we're gonna have Carlos Mata, Saxons guests.

Unknown Speaker 25:48
Awesome. And then kicking off the new year, January 15 2023, who's going to be

Unknown Speaker 25:58
that air find drummer Pepe merola's. And he gives a really exciting show. So people are going to want to come I believe he has a core chat. So not going to want to miss that folks.

Unknown Speaker 26:12
Most definitely. Well, thank you for sharing your I know you all, you are so busy and promoting jazz in Las Vegas and beyond. Any, any other words that you'd like to share to going into the new year?

Unknown Speaker 26:30
Well, we just come on out, support jazz folks, because you know, it is our as you say, read our American heritage. So yeah, all

Unknown Speaker 26:40
its forms wherever you can find it really. It's just it's a great thing to nurture and it's a really find a lot of benefits that you get from it, too.

Unknown Speaker 26:49
Yeah. Thank you.

Unknown Speaker 26:50
Thank you very much. Thanks

Unknown Speaker 26:52
to our guest this week, Abby Quinn from HELP of Southern Nevada, Dave Lowe from the UNLV music department and Eddie Saravia and Judy tart and Ryan Baker from the Las Vegas jazz society. If you'd like to hear this episode again, you can find the audio at KU in v.org on the podcast page, this is Rita Pardew with 91.5 Jazz and more

Transcribed by https://otter.ai