Ian Carr was a Scottish jazz musician, composer, writer, and educator. Carr performed and recorded with the Rendell-Carr quintet and jazz-rock band Nucleus, and was an associate professor at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London. He also wrote biographies of musicians Keith Jarrett and Miles Davis.
The One O’Clock Lab Band for 71 years has been the premier ensemble of the Jazz Studies Division at the University of North Texas College of Music in Denton. The band has performed and toured in Australia, Canada, England, Finland, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Switzerland, Thailand, and The Netherlands. Since the 1970s, the band’s albums have received seven Grammy nominations, including two for Lab 2009. Steve Wiest, a three-time Grammy-nominated composer-arranger-director and Associate Professor of Music, directed the O'Clock Lab Band from 2008 through the summer of 2014. Jay Saunders, a veteran of the Stan Kenton Orchestra, has been interim director since 2014. The One O’Clock is the highest of nine peer lab bands at the college, each named for its hour of rehearsal and each a standard 19-piece big band instrumentation — five saxophones, five trombones, five trumpets, piano, guitar, bass, and drums. The One O'Clock evolved from an extracurricular stage band founded in 1927 into a curricular laboratory dance band in 1947, when North Texas launched the first jazz degree program in the world. For the next 20 years — until 1967 — North Texas was the only US university that offered a degree in jazz studies.
Gerald Stanley Wilson was an American jazz trumpeter, big band bandleader, composer/arranger, and educator. Born in Mississippi, he was based in Los Angeles from the early 1940s. In addition to being a band leader, Wilson wrote arrangements for Duke Ellington, Sarah Vaughan, Ray Charles, Julie London, Dizzy Gillespie, Ella Fitzgerald, Benny Carter, Lionel Hampton, Billie Holiday, Dinah Washington, and Nancy Wilson.
Phillip Wilson was an American jazz drummer, known as a founding member of the Art Ensemble of Chicago, and as a member of the Paul Butterfield Blues Band.
Dixieland, sometimes referred to as hot jazz or traditional jazz, is a style of jazz based on the music that developed in New Orleans at the start of the 20th century.
The University of California Jazz Ensembles, also known as the UC Jazz Ensembles, UC Jazz, or UCJE, is the student jazz organization founded in 1967 on the University of California, Berkeley, campus. Founded in 1967, it comprises one or more big bands, numerous jazz combos, a vocal jazz ensemble, an alumni big band, and instructional classes. With a mission statement to foster a community for the performance, study, and promotion of jazz at U.C. Berkeley, its Wednesday Night big band provides free concerts every Thursday noon on Lower Sproul Plaza, its various units perform throughout the San Francisco Bay Area including area high schools, travel to collegiate jazz festivals, and perform overseas, and for many years it sponsored the annual Pacific Coast Jazz Festival. It also provides master classes by its instructors and clinics by prominent guest artists. It has nurtured numerous musicians who have become professional jazz musicians and educators. UC Jazz Ensembles is one of three groups, with the Cal (marching) Band and UC Choral Ensembles, forming Student Musical Activities (SMA), a department within Cal Performances on the U.C. Berkeley campus. Its members are primarily U.C. Berkeley undergraduate and graduate students, representing many academic disciplines.
Coming Through Slaughter: The Bolden Legend is the first large ensemble jazz album by composer Dave Lisik. It features trumpeter Tim Hagans, saxophonist Donny McCaslin, trombonist Luis Bonilla, and drummer Matt Wilson. The title and inspiration of the music and recording comes from the novel Coming Through Slaughter from the author Michael Ondaatje.
David W. Tucker (1929–2003) was a jazz trombonist, music educator, composer of band and orchestral music, record producer, and marching band arranger, most renowned as the director of the University of California Jazz Ensembles from 1969 until 1985. Under his direction, the organization expanded to become the largest musical organization on the campus of the University of California, Berkeley, had an international reputation resulting from foreign tours, and sponsored the Pacific Coast Collegiate Jazz Festival. Numerous student members of the organization have become renowned jazz musicians, composers, and music educators.
Robert Harry "Bob" Curnow is an American musician who served as a trombonist, staff arranger and producer for the Stan Kenton Orchestra during the 1960s and 1970s. As a composer and arranger he has become well known for large ensemble jazz music set to contemporary fusion and rock music of groups such as Chicago, Blood, Sweat and Tears, and the Yellowjackets. Most notably he arranged the music for and produced the award winning and critically acclaimed CD, Bob Curnow’s L.A. Big Band Plays The Music of Pat Metheny and Lyle Mays. His compositions and arrangements are heavily influenced by earlier writers for the Stan Kenton Orchestra such as Pete Rugolo, Bill Russo, Johnny Richards and Bill Holman. Curnow is currently owner and President of Sierra Music Publications, Inc., he is also prominent in the instrumental music and jazz education fields.
We're Back! is a 1986 album released by the California State University, Los Angeles Jazz Ensemble, it was the springboard for the Bob Curnow's arrangement of the Pat Metheny work The First Circle. The group proved to be one of the finest college jazz orchestras of that era with having placed in the finals of the Pacific Coast Collegiate Jazz Festival. The jazz band had numerous student musicians that have made a name for themselves as professionals to include Sharon Hirata, Luis Bonilla, Phil Feather, Jack Cooper, Charlie Richard, Eric "Bobo" Correa, Mark Gutierrez, Vince Dublino, and José Arellano.
Voices is an initial 2007 compact disc by the University of Memphis Southern Comfort Jazz Orchestra recorded in the studio. This was their 1st full-length feature CD release since a LP recording under the direction of Gene Rush in 1987. Since the late 1960s this group has been consistently recognized as one of the top collegiate jazz ensembles in the country recently being invited to the 2011 Jazz Education Network Convention, the 2000 International Association for Jazz Education Convention, and touring Europe in 1998. Musicians from this CD went on to study with Bob Brookmeyer at the New England Conservatory of Music, Indiana University, work professionally, and teach at universities.
Diversions is a 1987 album released by the California State University, Los Angeles Jazz Ensemble, it featured the Charles Richard Suite for Jazz Orchestra which was premiered by Dave Edwards earlier that year. This group proved to be one of the finest college jazz orchestras of that era with having placed in the finals of the Pacific Coast Collegiate Jazz Festival. The jazz band had numerous student musicians that have made a name for themselves as professionals to include Sharon Hirata, Luis Bonilla, Jack Cooper, Charlie Richard, Eric "Bobo" Correa, Vince Dublino, Alan Parr, and José Arellano.
Monstrosity! is the final LP Vinyl album release by the California State University, Los Angeles Jazz Ensemble before recording on digital/CD format in 1990. In addition to the big band the LP featured the CSULA Jazz Quintet which won the Pacific Coast Collegiate Jazz Festival Combo division for 1988. Los Angeles Times jazz critic Zan Stewart gave the recording four of five stars in his May 1989 review. The jazz band had numerous student musicians that have made a name for themselves as professionals to include Sharon Hirata, Luis Bonilla, Jack Cooper, Charlie Richard, Corey Gemme, Eric "Bobo" Correa, Vince Dublino, Alan Parr, Paul De Castro, Alex Henderson, and José Arellano.
It's About Time is the first CD digital format album release by the California State University, Los Angeles Jazz Ensembles completed in 1990. In addition to two big bands (1989/1990) the CD features the CSULA Jazz Sextet. The jazz bands had numerous student musicians that have made a name for themselves as professionals to include Luis Bonilla, Jack Cooper, Corey Gemme, Alan Parr, Randall Willis, Paul De Castro, Alex Henderson, Sheffer Bruton, Ruben Ramos, and José Arellano.
The United States Military Academy Band, West Point, New York is the first CD, digital format album released exclusively by The United States Military Academy Concert Band and Jazz Knights big band.
Upside Out is a CD by the Riverside City College Jazz Ensemble and combo; this was released in 2003 on the Sea Breeze Vista Jazz label. Critic Jack Bowers notes, "A consistently rewarding album by top-drawer college-level jazz ensemble and trio." Most notably the CD continues to receive airplay through the country due to the high level of the music on the recording.
Mists: Charles Ives for Jazz Orchestra is an internationally acclaimed jazz album produced by Planet Arts Recordings and released in August 2014. The recording is centered on Charles Ives' art song arranged for 17 piece jazz orchestra by composer Jack Cooper; this is a Third stream approach to jazz made more widely known by earlier band leaders and composers such as Paul Whiteman, Gunther Schuller, George Russell and Don Sebesky. The album is archived in the both the United States Library of Congress and the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek as a historically significant sound recording.
Dekajaz was a 10 piece concert jazz band based in Los Angeles. The group was critically acclaimed and most notably was founded to promote under-represented female jazz artists in the Southern California region much like the group Maiden Voyage. The group had many prominent performances in Los Angeles during their existence. Their album Eclectikos was released in September 2003.
