Saxophones and Reeds

Michael has been a faculty member of the UW School of Music since 1987, instructing saxophone performance and jazz arranging. He studied saxophone and composition at the New England Conservatory, the Berklee College of Music and the Musikhochschule at the University of Cologne. He has recorded with groups in Washington D.C. and Boston, and in Seattle with the Seattle Symphony Orchestra and the Clarence Acox Sextet. Brockman was presented the Champion of the Arts Award from the Kirkland Performance Center. He is director of the UW’s highly regarded “Jazz in Paris” program.

Alex is a graduate of Roosevelt High School and holds a B.A. in Jazz from the Eastman School of Music and a Master's Degree in Education from Seattle Pacific University.  He first performed with SRJO in 2006 in the Duke Ellington Sacred Music Concert and looks forward to this concert every year.  Alex is SRJO's Director of Education and leads SRJO's Clarence Acox Jazz Scholar's program. He also instructs in the music department of Bishop Blanchet High School and teaches band at six different Catholic grade schools in the Seattle area.  He works as a private instructor with Edmonds-Woodway High School bands and continues to perform in the greater Seattle area with his group FADE.

After graduating from high school, Sidney 

was accepted into the jazz program at the University of Washington. Although she took lessons with famous musicians such as Cuong Vu, Ted Poor, Bill Frisell, and Marc Seales (who was her mentor at the time), Sidney took time away in an effort to find her jazz voice and was accepted into the University of Washington School of fine and visual arts. During this time Sidney continued to perform jazz in various venues in Seattle including performing with Seattle Women's Jazz Orchestra. In addition, Sidney spearheaded a band at this time which has now morphed into her current band SmackTalk often described as performing jazz-funk fusion.  

Travis is a Seattle-based saxophonist with a stylistic emphasis on bop and swing jazz. He has been performing and touring since 1990 and has played with many jazz greats as well as with top local bands. His work includes performances with John Pizzarelli, Doc Severinsen, the Ramsay/Kleeb Orchestra with Pete Christlieb, and he toured in the Northwest region with the Duke Ellington Orchestra (under the direction of Paul Ellington). He has also been featured many times in the Port Townsend Jazz Festival Big Band.

Mark is a prominent voice in the Seattle jazz community both on the stage, and in our schools.  In addition to being a much sought after sideman, Mark can be heard regularly with two critically acclaimed groups he co-leads: LineUp!  (with pianist/vocalist Dawn Clement), and Human Spirit (with Thomas Marriott, and Matt Jorgensen).  Mark has been honored by Earshot Jazz as the “2008 NW Instrumentalist of the Year,” and the “2009 Jazz Recording of the Year” for Spectre (Origin Records).  An active educator, Mark works extensively as a private teacher, ensemble coach, festival clinician/guest artist, and recently joined the faculty at Cornish College of the Arts.  He holds a B.M. from the UW School of Music and M.M. from Manhattan School of Music.

Kate is an improvising saxophonist and music educator based in Seattle, WA.  She can be heard performing with her own projects KO SOLO and KO ELECTRIC, and as a collaborator with the Royal Room Collective Music Ensemble and Electric Circus (led by Wayne Horvitz), Birch Pereira and the Gin Joints, Battlestar Kalakala (formerly West Seattle Soul/the Pulsations) and with such Seattle staples as the Seattle Men’s and Women’s Choruses and cabaret producers Can Can Presents and Verlaine & McCann. Kate has a BA in Music (Jazz Emphasis) from the University of Wyoming and an MM in Improvisation from the University of Michigan, and is currently on the jazz faculty at Pacific Lutheran University.