This week, Jeff speaks with one of the most exciting musicians on the current jazz scene.September 19, 2008 at 6:45pm – Raised in rural tobacco country in North Carolina, Ellis grew up with a love of baseball, dewberry cobbler, turkey, and stuffing, and was more familiar with the sounds of hunting rifles and the dangers of snapping turtles than he was with the sounds of jazz.?
Ellis spent one year at the University of New Orleans under the direction of legendary jazz patriarch Ellis Marsalis; soon after that, he joined Mr. Marsalis's band.?
The world is going to hear a great deal more from John Ellis. As both a composer and a musician, Ellis is part of a fresh vanguard of jazz players carrying the music forward to a new generation of jazz fans.
Conversations with Jeff Duperon: every Friday at 6:45 pm on WRTI-FM