Bob Mintzer & WDR Big Band Cologne
Biography Bob Mintzer & WDR Big Band Cologne
Bob Mintzer
is an internationally celebrated jazz musician and longtime faculty member in the Jazz Studies program at USC Thornton. The saxophonist, conductor, and composer/arranger is a longstanding member of the GRAMMY Award-winning Yellowjackets, the fusion supergroup that released its first album in 1981. He leads big bands across the globe, performs with his own quartet, and plays with numerous artists.
In addition of an active performance schedule, Mintzer writes for orchestra, concert band and big band with over five hundred charts to his credit. His big band music is performed by groups all over the world. He has also written works for the National Symphony Orchestra, Metropole Orchestra of the Netherlands, HR Big Band in Frankfurt, and was commissioned to write a piece for concert band and tenor sax, Go, by a consortium of 50 universities.
Mintzer recently became the chief conductor of the WDR Big Band in Cologne, Germany. He honed his big band writing and playing skills in the bands of Tito Puente, Buddy Rich and Thad Jones-Mel Lewis.
As an instrumentalist, he has worked with Art Blakey, Jaco Pastorius, Sam Jones, Randy Brecker, Gil Evans, GRP All Star Big Band, Mike Manieri, and The New York Philharmonic, to name a few. He has done session work for James Taylor, Steve Winwood, Queen, Donald Fagan, Milton Nascimento, and countless others.
A respected educator, Mintzer is the recipient of the Bowen H. “Buzz” and Barbara M. McCoy Endowed Chair in Jazz Studies at USC Thornton. A professor of Jazz Studies, he is the conductor of the USC Thornton Jazz Orchestra.
Based in Los Angeles, he continues to conduct clinics and workshops worldwide. He has also written nearly twenty books which are an important part of the curriculum of jazz education everywhere.
