Jeff Ellwood is an important voice in education and on the tenor saxophone. He is the director of jazz studies at Mt. San Antonio College as well as adjunct faculty at Cal State Fullerton. This week, we caught up with Jeff to talk about his development as a musician, his approach to education, and his amazing book, Developing Bebop Lines. Jeff has studied with some of the most important teachers over the years and now has become one of the most important teachers in the jazz world.

Jeff has studied with the likes of Billy Pierce, George Garzone, James Moody, Rick Margitza, and Ralph Bowen. He has also performed with some of the top musicians such as Tony Bennett, Jerry Bergonzi, Bill Cunliffe, Eddie Daniels and Arturo Sandoval.

The link to his full biography, along with more Resources for this episode, is on our website.

In this episode, we discuss:

• Teaching music majors as well as non-majors and inspiring a love of music.
• Jeff’s time at Berklee and what some of the best teachers in the world did for him.
• His book, Developing Bebop Lines and how he approaches teaching this important language.
• How he approaches line writing and developing your own sound in the legacy of jazz.
• Jeff answers our 5 famous questions!

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