Chris Washburne is a rare musician whose musical interests cross cultural boundaries and styles. He refused to be limited to a particular style or genre early in his career and instead pursued a variety of musical paths. Chris currently works as a freelance studio musician, performing the trombone, bass trombone and tuba with various Latin, classical, jazz and rock groups in New York City. He has performed extensively throughout North America, Europe and Asia with various bands and has also toured extensively in the Caribbean, South America, Central America, Central America, and Africa. Chris earned his Bachelors of Music from the University of Wisconsin in classical trombone performance. He studied with Richard Davis, Les Thimmeg and William Richardson. He received his Masters in Third Stream Studies from the New England Conservatory of Third Stream Studies in 1988. There he also studied with Ran Blake, John Swallow and Bob Moses. He won the 1988 New England Conservatory Graduation Concerto Competition. In 1985, he spent two months in Zambia studying traditional music. He was awarded a Mellon Fellowship in 1993 to explore Cuba’s rich musical traditions. He received his Ph.D. from Columbia University in 1999 in ethnomusicology. He is currently an Associate Professor of Music at Columbia University and the Found Director of The Louis Armstrong Jazz Performance Programme. His articles have covered jazz, Latin jazz and salsa. He is the author of “Sounding Salsa” (2008), and the editor of “Bad Music (2004). He has performed with Tito Puente’s Duke Ellington Orchestra and Celia Cruz’s Ruben Blades, Marc Anthony’s Celine Dion, Anthony Braxton and the Manhattan Chamber Orchestra. He is a member and leader of the highly acclaimed SYOTOS and NYNDK groups, as well as FFEAR (Forum for Electo-Acoustic Research). from http://chriswashburne.com
