On Wednesday, Nov. 5, student musicians performed at the first-ever “KRLX Live @ the Contented Cow” event, a live music night put on by Carleton’s student-run radio station (KRLX) hosted at the local Northfield pub.
“KRLX is always really interested in live music events, and it’s a goal to have as many of those as we can per term. They let us showcase student bands who don’t have music on streaming services or physical media,” said Eila Planinc ’26, who is on the KRLX board and organized the live show.
According to Planic, the setting of the Contented Cow was chosen primarily because it expanded the audience of the live from being solely Carleton students to the greater Northfield community.
“We’re looking for more ways to connect KRLX to the Northfield community and to get Carleton students off campus,” Planinc said. “I think this was pretty successful! We had a mix of Carls and Northfield locals.”
The live show featured performances by the band The North Star Trio, which is composed of Teddy Dozier ’28, Oscar Hayes ’28 and Benjamin Young ’28.
“The three of us met at the start of freshman fall,” said Dozier. “My roommate, Nacho Obando, and I were forming a nine-piece Latin jazz fusion ensemble called Caballeros Sin Nombre. We brought on Ben to be the drummer for that group and Oscar to be the saxophonist […] and then we later on decided to start playing together as a trio and doing smaller gigs on the side. Kind of as an avenue to play different music that we weren’t doing in Caballeros, to branch out to different things we were interested in.”
The setlist for the show was a synthesis of all the band members’ musical interests, arranged to make listeners’ experiences seamless.
“The song that we started with was a song that we played back in the spring [at KRLX live], and we wanted to kind of do a reprise,” Dozier said. “We then brought “Footprints” by Wayne Shorter, and when we were rehearsing it, … we realized that the tune is in the key of C minor, which is the same key as “Red Clay,” which is another tune we played last year. And so I suggested that we could transition into “Red Clay,” so we worked that into a set and ended up playing a little suite.”
The live event drew many students who were intrigued to see live music performed by fellow Carleton students.
“I was curious to see Carleton’s student bands perform,” Anastasia Sichel-Hahn ’29 said. “I love jazz music, and they played some of my favorite songs, like “Footprints,” “Equinox” and “Round Midnight.” I was super excited to hear that. And I thought the atmosphere was very supportive. It was definitely less academic than some of the performances I have been to here and more casual, and I appreciated that.”
Both The North Star Trio and KRLX have expressed plans to work on similar events in the future. “It was some of the most fun that I have had this year playing,” Dozier said. “If they do more events like this, I’d be down.”
“Stay tuned – KRLX Live @ The Cow is coming back for sure,” said Planinc.
