Few students make it into the UW-Eau Claire Jazz Ensemble I. That’s because the level of musicianship each member in the Ensemble has is through the roof.

Few students can say they played “Hot Cross Buns” on piano in a recital at age two. That’s because most of us could barely talk.

Few students compose an original album and have an orchestra named after them. That’s because we’re not Aaron Hedenstrom.

Hedenstrom is a senior music composition major. He’s played many different instruments including saxophones, clarinets, flute, piano, guitar and bass trombone among others. Hedenstrom plays saxophone in Jazz Ensemble I, which is notoriously hard to get into.

In addition, Hedenstrom just finished recording an album of nine of his original compositions with a group of 20-30 other musicians who mostly have roots in the jazz program at UW-Eau Claire.

But it didn’t begin there…

Hedenstrom says his love of music and performing started at age two.

“It’s really one of the only memories from that age that I actually remember,” said Hedenstrom. “I remember (being on stage) was such a thrill and I just loved to do it from the beginning.”

Hedenstrom said he then started taking piano lessons formally in third grade, but he wasn’t really serious about it, though it was definitely fun for him. He then picked up saxophone in fourth grade, but suffered because of his school’s band program. However, in middle school, his new band teacher gave him the inspiration he needed to keep going with music.

Then in high school, he said he started listening to John Coltrane and Charlie Parker and idolizing them. As he started jazz piano lessons, another group that inspired him and motivated him to continue playing piano was Ben Folds Five. He would transcribe Ben Folds’ music by ear and play it back.

“That was one of the best experiences in my musical training,” said Hedenstrom, “How do those guys do it? They play it so perfectly every time!”

In school, he started playing bass trombone in band just to try it, but he stuck with it.

Hedenstrom said his entire family is musically inclined. His father plays a little guitar and percussion and his mother loves to play the piano. His cousin is a classically trained pianist who was taught by his mother. Even his grandmother is a pianist and an organist.

With such a musical family, Aaron was brought up with it, and it’s a huge part of his life.

After coming to Eau Claire, Hedenstrom joined Wind Symphony where he plays bass clarinet, and Jazz where he plays saxophone.

Director of Jazz Studies, Robert Baca said he has enjoyed working with Hedenstrom immensely.

“It is wonderful working with (him) because even greater than his musical talent is his character,” said Baca. “He is a great example.”

Baca praised Hedenstrom’s sense of music history by comparing it to John Coltrane. Miles Davis and John Coltrane worked together for many years, and Baca mentioned what Davis said about Coltrane in an interview when asked where Coltrane’s genius came from.

“Miles Davis said Coltrane had studied everything that there was musically up to the present day,” said Baca, “and he said Coltrane just started to hear new things, but that was based on the history that he had heard and studied before that. Aaron is very much out of that line.”

Hedenstrom’s sense of music history doesn’t stop with jazz. He says he takes much influence from classical composers as well, and even does his own classical compositions in addition to his other ones.

While involved with the jazz and band programs, he was able to meet and collaborate with many other students including Eau Claire alumnus Sean Carey, who just released an album called “All We Grow” on Jagjaguwar Records. Hedenstrom appeared on the album playing clarinet in the album’s introduction.

“There’s a bunch of little winding chords,” Hedenstrom said. “Basically, I just recorded a bunch of notes for him, and he just cut it up and put it together.”

The collaboration definitely didn’t end there as Hedenstrom employed 20 to 30 musicians including Carey to record nine of Hedenstrom’s original compositions for an album.

Hedenstrom said the group is called the Aaron Hedenstrom Orchestra and consists of many of Hedenstrom’s friends and peers from Eau Claire, Minneapolis and New York.

It’s big.

“It was one of those things where I just had the vision for it,” Hedenstrom said, “and for the first time, I had such a clear vision of what I was going to do with it, that nothing really slowed me down on the way.”

That’s not to say that getting 20-plus people together for one big recording session was easy. As one can imagine, Hedenstrom had trouble finding a day that would work for the whole group, but he finally found one lucky day where everyone could be there.

The orchestra parts were tracked in one day in about six hours. Local sound engineer, Jamie Hansen, recorded the songs in Gantner Concert Hall in Haas Fine Arts Center, and Hedenstrom was pleased.

“He’s brilliant,” Hedenstrom said. “He did another CD that I recorded live last year and he was just so impressive. He’ll take any room and any mic set-up and make it work and make it sound great.”

The Aaron Hedenstrom Orchestra album is entitled “A Symphonic Jazz Hip-Hop Experience” and Hedenstrom says it’s done and available, but he would like to do an official release with an accompanying performance with most, if not the whole orchestra sometime soon.

In addition to the work he put into his album, Hedenstrom’s senior recital was Wednesday night All the pieces featured were his compositions including classical pieces, a jazz piece for seven players, a string quartet and two chamber ensemble pieces.

Baca thinks that Hedenstrom will do well no matter what.

“For working in our business today, talent in our business is very important,” he said, “(but) character is more important, and he possesses that quality.”

Hedenstrom agrees that music is more than memorizing and reading.

“My way of seeing music and continually seeing it more and more is just a spiritual experience, and I can’t say enough about that,” said Hedenstrom. “That’s my belief, and I think that’s what drives me to do projects and hopefully will be continuing to push me in a direction that will be positive.”