Pounding out the strains of classical jazz on a grand piano, senior music major Devon Newburn found himself both impt-essing his audience and getting carried away by the music.This was not his first time performing by any means, but the night of entertainment was different for Newburn for one reason : he was performing in San Diego, Calif., at the Alpha Chi National Honor Society's annual convent1on. Many honor societies had acqu1red a reputation for being exclusive of the arts. Like those organizations, Alpha Chi Honor Society was designed to recognize students for high achievement. Members had to have a minimum of a 3.75 grade point average (GPA) on at least 104 credit hours for seniors and a 3.85 GPA on at least 80 credit hours for juniors. Alpha Chi was not all about the grades, however; it also provided a forum for students to showcase their talents, whether academic or artistic, and to also give back to their community. Through Alpha Chi, Newburn broke the mold. Newburn had played piano since he was nine years old and had since learned to play clarinet, guitar, violin, harmonica and flute. After coming to Harding, Newburn learned to play jazz piano. He performed with the Harding Jazz Band, Peppered Blue jazz combo, the Harding Orchestra and the Harding Chorus. "It's been like learning another language, and I love it," Newbum said. "Jazz music is bringing out a new pet-spective in my musicianship that has been a lot of fun. The thing about jazz is, there are basically no rules - you have so much freedom to let go and let the music become your voice." Newburn planned to attend gt-aduate school for piano performance. He also considered eventually 2 4 2 organizations open1ng a music school in South America as a vocational mission outreach tool. "As a class1cal pianist, I really enjoy sharing the joy of music that is often hundreds of years old yet is still relevant and connects with people today," Newburn said. Newburn played the piano at the Alpha Chi National Convention March 31 - Apl-il2, 2011 in San Diego, Calif. The convention was devoted to showcasing students' scholarly and creative presentations from a variety of academic fields. "I played three piano pieces by Darius Milhaud, who Iived around the turn of the 20th century," Newbum said. "He was a French diplomat in Brazil and wrote the pieces 'Copacabana,' 'lpanema' and 'Sorocaba' as representations of three of the 12 districts of Rio de Janeiro." Besides highlighting members' presentations, the Alpha Ch1 convention also gave back to the community each year through a service project. In 2010, for the third consecutive year, Alpha Chi partnered with Reading Is Fundamental (RIF), a nationall1teracy organization, to collect and distribute books to local literacy programs working with children. In 2010, Harding, along with other colleges in the region, collected and donated 1,800 books to Arkansas Children's Hospital in Little Rock, Ark. Newburn said he was grateful to Alpha Chi for these kinds of opportunities, especially the opportunity to present something he was interested in at the national convention. "Alpha Chi is giving me the chance to experience something I may never get to experience again and have a great time doing it," Newburn said. jessica Boyd
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