About the Directors

Wayne Wallace is professor of practice in jazz studies and jazz trombone at the IU Jacobs School of Music. A seven-time Grammy nominee, he is one of the most respected exponents of African American Latin music in the world today. Wallace is known for his use of traditional forms and styles in combination with contemporary music and has earned wide critical acclaim, including placement in both the trombone and producer categories of the DownBeat Critics Poll. An accomplished arranger, educator, and composer with compositions for film and television, he has received grants from the Creative Work Fund, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Lila Wallace Foundation, and the San Francisco Arts Commission. Wallace has performed, recorded, and studied with many acknowledged masters of the Afro-Latin and jazz idioms, such as Aretha Franklin, Bobby Hutcherson, Earth Wind and Fire, Pete Escovedo, Santana, and many more. This experience has provided a solid foundation for Wallace’s current explorations of the intersections of a wealth of cultural styles and rhythmic concepts. Born and raised in San Francisco, Wallace was exposed to blues, country and western, R&B, jazz, and Afro-Caribbean music at an early age. The fertile musical environment of the San Francisco Bay Area shaped his career. His studies of Afro-Latin music and jazz include trips to Cuba, New York City, and Puerto Rico. Widely respected as a teacher and historian, Wallace has taught at San José State University, Stanford University, and the Jazzschool in Berkeley. He has conducted lectures, workshops, and clinics in the Americas and Europe since 1983. Head of the critically acclaimed Patois Records, Wallace has created a unique record label with a passionate mission of developing and chronicling the multilingual styles of the San Francisco Bay Area music scene. Under his direction the label has released 13 recordings to critical acclaim, including recordings by Wallace, Marc and Paul van Wageningen, and vocalists Kat Parra, Alexa Weber-Morales, and Kristina. He is an endorser of Conn-Selmer trombones.

Andy Miller is lecturer in music in percussion at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, with an emphasis in Latin jazz and Afro-Latin percussion music. An engaging performer and passionate educator, he navigates the diverse world of percussion with technical and musical precision across a broad range of artistic practices. Fostering a deep interest in the percussion music of the African diaspora, Miller has studied with master percussionists in the United States and internationally. A Fulbright grant recipient, Miller studied Afro-Colombian currulao, cumbia, and bullerengue in Colombia with La Wey Segura, Francis Lara, and Emilsen Pacheco, later returning on a Presser Graduate Music Award to study joropo music with Fernando Torres Ramirez. Miller conducted field research in Brazil with Jorge Alabê for his doctoral project, “The Language of Drumming in Afro-Brazilian Candomblé Ketu.” His study of bomba percussion, song, and dance took him to Puerto Rico to study with Beto Torrens, Marién Torres, Rafa Maya, and Hector “Coco” Baréz. He studied Guinean mande drumming with Bolokada Conde and Afro-Cuban folkloric and popular percussion with Michael Spiro. Miller also champions percussion art music by Latin American composers, including a performance of Ricardo Lorenz’s Venezuelan maracas concerto Pataruco with the Jacobs School’s University Orchestra. Commissions include Maria José by Luis Fernando Sanchez Gooding, Silent Surface by Rafael Llanos, and Monologue IV: Bilingüismo by José Martinez. His commitment to new music has led to residencies with the Bang on a Can Summer Music Festival and the Atlantic Music Festival Contemporary Ensemble. His collaborations with choreographers as a composer/performer have premiered in New York City, throughout the Midwest, and internationally. Miller served as music director of the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee Dance Department (2017-24), accompanying classes in styles including modern, ballet, West African, and Afro-Latin dance. He previously taught percussion at the Lawrence University Conservatory of Music, Olivet Nazarene University, and Bembé Drum and Dance. Miller earned degrees from IU (D.M.), the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (M.M.), and Wright State University (B.M.).