Steve Swell

-- photo by John Rogers -- Steve Swell (born in Newark, NJ, December 6, 1954) is an American free jazz trombonist and composer. Swell moved to New York City in 1975 where he began his musical life, playing in top 40 bands, salsa bands, big bands (most notably those of Buddy Rich and Lionel Hampton) and performed on Broadway in Bob Fosse's "Dancin"". He then became a member of Makanda Ken McIntyre's band which led to tours and recordings with Tim Berne, Joey Baron, Herb Robertson, Jemeel Moondoc, Anthony Braxton, Cecil Taylor, William Parker, Bill Dixon, Butch Morris, John Zorn, Elliot Sharp, Rob Mazurek, Perry Robinson.

He is greatly influenced by Roswell Rudd, with whom he studied in the mid 1970s. He was also a student of Grachan Moncur III and Jimmy Knepper.

Swell has a number of projects including Slammin' The Infinte (w/Sabir Mateen, Matthew Heyner, Klaus Kugel), Fire Into Music (w/William Parker, Jemeel Moondoc, Hamid Drake), Unified Theory Of Sound (w/Cooper-Moore, Matt Lavelle) and his large ensemble Nation Of We (aka NOW Ensemble).

Steve has received a number of awards including a USArtsInternational (NEA) travel grant, grants from MCAF (LMCC), Foundation for Contemporary Arts and was nominated for Trombonist of Year, 2008 by the Jazz Journalists Association

Complete discography at http://www.home.earthlink.net/~sdswell/For sound, video, press go to http://www.steveswell.com