Tommy Sauter

Vance Thompson: Lost and Found

by Jack Bowers
February 7, 2026

For several years, Vance Thompson's career as a musician hung in the balance. Owing to a neurological disorder known as Focal Dystonia, the Grammy-nominated trumpeter and founder of the Knoxville Jazz Orchestra was literally unable to blow his own horn. But unlike other people who may have thrown in the towel or called it a day, Thompson instead looked for an alternative, set his mind and body to work and learned to play a second instrument, namely the vibraphone.