Performer, composer, arranger, educator and arts administrator Dan Thomas has received countless performance awards, and has performed, recorded and presented with some of the most influential jazz artists and pedagogues in nearly every state in the continental US, Canada, and abroad. Thomas’ CDs, City Scope, Musical Sanctuary, and Voyage continue to receive critical acclaim, and acknowledgement on the national airplay charts.
Thomas is the Director of Jazz Studies and the Chair of the music program at Ottawa University – Kansas City. He has held previous appointments having served as the Executive Director and CEO of the Kansas City Jazz Orchestra. For nearly two decades, he served on the Doctoral faculty and as the co-chair of the Jazz Studies Program at UMKC’s Conservatory of Music and Dance with Bobby Watson. His students perform throughout the globe and teach at the highest levels, and have appeared many times at the Kennedy Center’s Betty Carter’s Jazz Ahead program, Jazz Port Townsend workshops, the Monterey Jazz Festival, and JEN. Students have been recognized in numerous jazz competitions and received many awards, notably in Downbeat, by Thelonious Monk, MTNA, Yamaha, ITG, Name, Music for All, Grammy, Bard Summer Jazz Academy (JALCO), the National Youth Orchestra, and the Vandoren jazz saxophone competition, among other.
Thomas holds performing artist/educator endorsements with Yamaha, Vandoren, Locoparasaxo, WeWOOD, and Roo Pads.