elizabeth!

I had a blast playing trombone for Jessica Sanchez and Joshua Ledet on American Idol last week!

Here I am posing outside of our dressing room…

…which happened to be next to Ryan Seacrest’s dressing room. (He wasn’t in.)

A great shot backstage of all the fantastic horn players: Sarah Nelson, Mindi Abair, Jessy J, Anne King, and me!

Tune in Wednesday May 9th to catch me performing on American Idol! Along with an all-star female horn section, I’ll be backing up contestants Joshua Ledet and Jessica Sanchez!

The good people at Bouke Wine on Long Island chose the photograph featured on the cover of my first album, “hot & silver,” for a greeting card!

Props to John Mazlish for a fantastic photo session, and to Lisa for asking thoughtful questions of me for her blog. Check out the interview! In honor of the occasion, I’ve reduced the price of the album to just $3.00 until May 15! Get it now!

I am honored to learn that my song “Memphis Mix-Up” has been nominated as a finalist for best jazz composition in the International Songwriting Competition!

Please VOTE for it – you can vote once/day through March 31!

Dan Schlessinger and I met in the winter of 2001, and have been musical colleagues and friends ever since! He’s a fantastic musician and a super-smart guy, so he’s a lot of fun to be around!

He moved to San Francisco a few years ago to add electrical engineering and microphone design to his resume (he now works for Sennheiser), so we don’t get to play as often. But I just couldn’t imagine “Eye for an Eye” without him on soprano saxophone, and asked him to add his two cents from afar. Check it out!

His great new album, “Sailors Gone” (under the name Dan Moses), features me on trombone and backing vocals. Listen to “Bold, Bold Step” for a great introduction. If you’re in the San Francisco area, catch Dan! Here he is this past weekend at the NAMM conference with Kay Ashley (left) and Kate Kilbane, also great musicians and songwriters.