Wycliffe Gordon
The ASCAP Foundation Vanguard Award

Trombonist, composer, conductor, arranger and educator – all of these terms apply to the musical polymath known as Wycliffe Gordon. A native of Waynesboro, Georgia, Gordon is the product of a family steeped in church music. Gordon was invited to join the Wynton Marsalis Septet and the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra in 1989. He has since amassed a list of credits that any jazz musician would envy: nine albums as leader, and three as co-leader; performances behind Dizzy Gillespie, Shirley Horn, Lionel Hampton and Tommy Flanagan; and major awards from the Jazz Journalists Association. Gordon is a committed music educator, serving on the faculty of the Jazz Studies Program at The Juilliard School; working extensively with young musicians and audiences from elementary schools to universities in master classes, children’s concerts and lectures; and preparing trombone method books. Wycliffe Gordon is a wonderful exemplar of celebrating the past with a contemporary freshness and laying the foundation for an even greater jazz future.