Jeff Tobias

My main creative activity these days is contributing via alto saxophone and synthesizer to the punk/psych/jazz group Sunwatchers. We’ve released a torrent of music since 2014 on beloved record labels including Trouble in Mind, Castle Face, and Amish. I also play reeds in the U.K.-based group Modern Nature, bass guitar in the “rock instrument music” ensemble Thee Reps, and bass clarinet with David First’s Western Enisphere. I’ve been fortunate enough to perform and record with brilliant artists including Brigid Dawson (The Oh Sees), A. Savage (Parquet Courts), Arthur Doyle, Mega Bog, Eugene Chadbourne, Matana Roberts, Katie Eastburn, Ziemba, Dan Friel, We Versus the Shark, and many others. To date, I have contributed to over eighty physically released recordings, and I tour regularly throughout North America and Europe.

My saxophone playing has been described as “authentically fearsome … just the sort of thing that fries microphones and never pays the rent.” (Bill Meyer, The Wire, March 2018) I have fact-checked this and it is accurate.

I hold a degree in music composition from Brooklyn College, where I studied composition with Tania Leon, Jason Eckardt, Doug Geers and Doug Cohen. I also studied saxophone performance at BC with JD Parran.

I have written about music and politics for outlets including the Brooklyn Rail, Flagpole Magazine, Creative Loafing (ATL), and others.

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