Home » Jazz Musicians » José Gobbo

José Gobbo

Jose Gobbo is a Brazilian jazz guitarist. He moved to Iowa City in 2011 to pursue his master's degree in jazz performance, and soon took a leadership role in the city's musical scene. His debut album as a leader was released in 2013, titled “Zé“, featuring legendary multi-instrumentalist Roberto Sion. Other activities during that time include performances at the Iowa City Jazz Festival; International clarinet convention with Dr. Maurita Marx; John Rapson's recording of “The Night Sky and Turquoise Sea”. 
 
Moving to Illinois in 2014, Jose kept a busy performance schedule while pursuing his doctoral degree (DMA), completed in 2020.
 
He appears regularly with the Brad Wheeler Quartet and the Chip Stephens Organ Trio, which opened a Steely Dan concert and recorded the album "Transgressions" in 2019. In 2020 Jose co-founded The House Trio with Ben Taylor and Nikola Djokic, which performed 52 consecutive weekly live streams on their YouTube Channel, and recorded the album "Live from Home", featuring 10 of Jose's original compositions. Jose also performs with his UIUC mentors Chip McNeill, Tito Carrillo, Larry Gray, Jim Pugh, and Ron Bridgewater. 
 
In 2018, Jose was a finalist at Chicago's Luminarts Jazz Competition, winning popular vote, and was a semi-finalist at Milwaukee's Wilson Center Guitar Competition. He worked as producer and performer in two Brazilian Tours with Jim Pisano and Damani Phillips. He was selected amongst applicants from all fields of the arts as Artist in Residency at Allerton Park in 2022, where he developed and recorded 6 solo guitar pieces to be released as the Allerton Suite. In 2022 alone Jose performed in major cities such as New York, Chicago, St. Louis, Nashville, and Cincinnati. 
 
Jose's teaching experience includes two years as a Teaching Assistant in the Jazz Department at The University of Iowa, and two years at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He also worked for two years in the Latin American Studies Department at UIUC. He has been featured as a guest artist at Southeast Missouri State University, Belmont University, Millikin University, Western Illinois University, University of Iowa, State University of Campinas (Brazil), and Federal University of Uberlandia (Brazil). Jose taught at Lincoln College, in Lincoln, IL, University of Illinois Springfield, and currently teaches at Eastern Illinois University and the Arthur School District. 


Tags

1
Album Review

José Gobbo Trio: Confluence

Read "Confluence" reviewed by Troy Dostert


Guitarist José Gobbo brought his background in Brazilian music and jazz to Iowa City in 2011, when he began a master's program at the University of Iowa. Since then, he has honed a compelling voice on his instrument, fusing the danceable rhythms of Brazilian folk forms with a more contemporary guitar sound. One of his central creative outlets involves his trio with bassist Max Beckman and drummer Jay Ferguson. The group released its promising debut album, Current (Self Produced), in ...

5
Album Review

Andrew Binder: Conspiracy Deliracy

Read "Conspiracy Deliracy" reviewed by Geannine Reid


Andrew Binder's Conspiracy Deliracy builds a themed program that combines modern jazz sensibilities with the intriguing world of conspiracy theories. At the core of the album are Binder's compositions, which find inspiration in today's popular music and combine that with jazz and classical compositional techniques. Each piece explores various conspiracy theories, from the imaginative to the ridiculous. “Squatch Watch" reimagines John Coltrane's “Giant Steps" through a lens of myth and mystery, enriched by the writing style of Wayne Shorter. “Birds ...

Read more articles

Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

Confluence

Calligram Records
2025

buy

Current

Independent
2024

buy

Conspiracy Deliracy

Self Produced
2023

buy

Get more of a good thing!

Our weekly newsletter highlights our top stories, our special offers, and upcoming jazz events near you.

Install All About Jazz

iOS Instructions:

To install this app, follow these steps:

All About Jazz would like to send you notifications

Notifications include timely alerts to content of interest, such as articles, reviews, new features, and more. These can be configured in Settings.