To the editor:

I think it is wonderful for Kansas University to have such outstanding organizations as our basketball team that bring positive notoriety to our community. Our athletes are talented academically as well as on the basketball court. For our team to reach the NCAA championship game indicates good coaching and a determined dedication of the players to achieve their highest goals.

I would like to bring to your attention another group of dedicated students that has excelled far beyond the reasonable demands of their teachers and the requirements of their degree programs. I am referring to the KU Saxophone Quartet I that won the 2003 Down Beat magazine Annual Student Music Awards Competition as the best classical instrumental chamber music group in the United States and Canada.

Saxophone Quartet I competed against instrumental chamber music groups (brass quintets, string quartets, woodwind quintets, brass ensembles and mixed ensembles) from colleges and universities throughout the United States and Canada. This is an international award, and it is a tremendous honor to be at the top of this elite category of classical musicians.

The award will be listed in the June 2003 issue of Down Beat magazine. The quartet is under the direction of Vincent Gnojek, professor of saxophone studies at KU. Achievements and talent such as this, both on the part of the students and the teacher, should not go unnoticed.

Richard W. Johnston,

Lawrence