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Sean Dobbins
Sean Dobbins got his start as a sought-after Detroit area jazz sideman at a young age, when he would regularly play with Blue Note artist Louis Smith.
Though still young by jazz standards, Dobbins has amassed an impressive list of playing companions. He has performed/toured/recorded with Johnny Basset, Benny Golson, Dr. Lonnie Smith, Frank Morgan, Joey DeFrancesco, George Cables, James "Blood" Ulmer, Paul Finkbeiner, Larry Willis, Rodney Whitaker, Johnny O'Neal, Paul Keller, Tad Weed, Kurt Krahnke, Kelly Broadway, David "Fathead" Newman, Donald Walden, Ramona Collins, Michael Gabriel, and Firefly Jazz Club owner Susan Chastain.
Sean's sound can best be described as hard-driving, solid rhythm with refreshing melodic sensibility. Some of Sean's influences include Art Blakey, Jeff Hamilton, Jeff "Tain" Watts, Ed Thigpen, Sonny Payne, and also Detroit area greats Gerald Cleaver and Pete Siers.
A product of the Ann Arbor Public Schools, Sean has stayed devoted to education throughout his life. Early mentor Louis Smith, an Ann Arbor Public Schools band teacher, impressed the importance of a good education upon Sean at an early age. Sean is known in his community as a band director, drum teacher and positive influence for many.
Sean is no stranger to local headlines; he frequently plays at venues such as the Firefly Club (Ann Arbor), Baker's Keyboard Lounge (Detroit), the Music Hall Jazz Cafe (Detroit), Murphy's Place (Toledo) and Buddy Guy's (Chicago). His recent recordings include "Odyssey" (PKO Records), "Revealing" (Reparation Records), and "Christmas Songs for Jazz Lovers" (PKO Records), to name a few.
Look for Sean live with his new groups: "Dobbins, Krahnke and Weed", "The Modern Jazz Messengers", and also various local and national acts.
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John Fedchock: Justifiably J.J.
by Jack Bowers
Among jazz trombonists with a sense of history, the name J.J. Johnson is spoken with an admiration that borders on reverence. Johnson was a pacesetter, a creative and articulate slideman and improviser who, either alone or with sometime partner Kai Winding, held the keys to the trombone kingdom from the early 1940s until his retirement more than half a century later. In the early '40s, Johnson brought the trombone--long associated with swing and Dixieland bands--forward into the bop world of ...
Continue ReadingJohn Fedchock: Justifiably J.J.
by Pierre Giroux
The accomplished trombonist John Fedchock has released Justifiably J.J., a heartfelt tribute to one of the most innovative figures in jazz, trombonist J.J. Johnson on the occasion of his centennial. Recorded live at The Jazz Kitchen, Indianapolis, Indiana, on March 3, 2024 (Johnson's hometown), Fedchock was accompanied by three top players: pianist Steve Allee, bassist Jeremy Allen and drummer Sean Dobbins. The session features eight swinging compositions written by or associated with Johnson, but instead of attempting to reinvent or ...
Continue ReadingJohn Fedchock: Justifiably J.J.
by Dan McClenaghan
J.J. Johnson saved his instrument from possible obscurity. Rarely used as a front-line instrument pre-Johnson, the trombone might have faded away when bebop came along. Bebop--all those rapid-fire notes from trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie and alto saxophonist Charlie Parker. At that time, the trombone was considered too cumbersome to navigate the chord changes and the rhythmic fury of the new music. J.J. Johnson proved otherwise, starting with several recording dates for Prestige and Savoy Records from 1946 to 1949.
Continue ReadingBuselli / Wallarab Jazz Orchestra: The Gennett Suite
by Dan McClenaghan
This is where music for mass consumption--recorded music--started, in Richmond, Indiana, in the 1920s, in a piano factory by the railroad tracks in a glacier-carved gorge. Established in 1887, in the beginning Starr Pianos' bread and butter was pianos, but they branched out to selling other instruments and eventually photographs and records--their own records, recorded in the piano factory, taking breaks in the process when a train came by. At first, they called their recording side of the business Starr ...
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Dippermouth Blues
From: The Gennett SuiteBy Sean Dobbins
