Teaching School Jazz

Chad West is Associate Professor and Chair of music education at Ithaca College. Prior to his appointment, he served as a public school band director for eight years, as Associate Conductor of the Atlanta Wind Symphony, and as a trumpeter for Princess Cruise Lines. He has published over 20 music education journal articles and has edited two books with Oxford University Press. He is a frequent presenter at state, national, and international music education conferences on the topics of preservice music teacher education, popular music education, and jazz pedagogy. Mike Titlebaum is Associate Professor and Director of Jazz Studies at Ithaca College, where he directs the Jazz Ensemble, coaches combos, and teaches jazz saxophone and courses in jazz standards, arranging, repertoire, and pedagogy. He has played in many of New York's world famous musical venues, including the Blue Note, Smalls, Augies, Fez Under Time Café, and the infamous CBGB's as well as the pit orchestra of the Broadway musical Cats. He has performed with dozens of internationally recognized artists and groups such as Jason Robert Brown, Red Rodney, the Mingus Big Band, Cab Calloway, Natalie Cole, Billy Taylor, Mel Torme, Branford Marsalis, Paquito D'Rivera, and many others.