UW’s 2026 Jazz Festival Concert to Feature Grammy Winner Michael Dease

The University of Wyoming Music Department’s annual UWYO Jazz Festival will return Monday, Feb. 23, at 5 p.m. in the Buchanan Center for the Performing Arts concert hall. The festival will conclude with a premier evening concert featuring Grammy-winning trombonist Michael Dease.

Tickets are available at www.tix.com/ticket-sales/uwyo/6984, in person or at (307) 766-6666 at the Performing Arts box office, Monday through Friday, noon-6 p.m., and one hour before performances.

Directed by UW jazz faculty members Andrew Wheelock and Ben Markley, this full-day event brings together talented middle and high school big bands, combos and vocal ensembles from across the region for workshops, clinics and performances at the Buchanan Center for the Performing Arts.

Headliner Dease is one of the world’s eminent trombonists, lending his versatile sound and signature improvisations to over 250 recordings and groups as diverse as Grammy-winning artists David Sanborn, Christian McBride, Michel Camilo and Alicia Keys. Born in Augusta, Ga., Dease was a late bloomer on the instrument, switching from saxophone to trombone at age 17 before joining the The Juilliard School’s historic first jazz class.

A multi-Grammy Award winner and 2025 Guggenheim Fellow, Dease has topped The DownBeat Critics Poll as Trombonist of the Year five times. A premier soloist and bandleader, his 2025 release, “Flow (Posi-Tone),” marks his 21st album as a leader. Dease has played with prestigious ensembles, including the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra and the Dizzy Gillespie All-Star Big Band.

Beyond the stage, Dease is a dedicated educator serving as the Red Cedar Distinguished Professor of Jazz Trombone at Michigan State University. He also directs the Jazz Institute at Brevard and the Seiko Summer Jazz Camp in Japan. Dease also was awarded the 2023 Ellis Marsalis Jr. Jazz Educator of the Year by the Jazz Education Network. As a Yamaha Performing Artist, he continues to shape the future of jazz through both his prolific discography on labels like Posi-Tone Records and his mentorship of the next generation of musicians.

Other guest artists and adjudicators at the 2026 UWYO Jazz Festival include bassists Alex Annan and Seth Lewis; guitarist Ben Parrish; trumpeter and flugelhornist Jonathan Saraga; trombonist Altin Seneclar; and saxophonist Wil Swindler.

For more information, email Wheelock at awheeloc@uwyo.edu or call (307) 721-2179.