John Clayton is a 10-time Grammy-nominated bassist/composer/educator whose talents are consistently requested in the jazz industry. In 2008, he received a Grammy award for his arrangement of “I’m Going to Live Til I Die,” written for Queen Latifah. Clayton’s serious study of the double bass began at age 16 when he studied with famed bassist, Ray Brown. At age 19, Clayton was the bassist for Henry Mancini’s television series The Mancini Generation. Later he completed his studies at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music in 1975, graduating with a Bachelor of Music in Double Bass Performance. Touring with Monty Alexander and the Count Basie Orchestra followed. Four years later, he held the principal bass position in the Amsterdam Philharmonic Orchestra for five years. Clayton has written and arranged music, often for the Clayton-Hamilton Jazz Orchestra (CHJO), featuring Diana Krall, McCoy Tyner, Milt Jackson, Quincy Jones, Dr. John, , and many others. He has been commissioned by many ensembles, including Cleveland City Music Orchestra, the WDR Big Band, the Amsterdam Philharmonic, and the American Jazz Philharmonic. No stranger to platinum record status, he was awarded one for his stirring arrangement of “The Star-Spangled Banner” performed by Whitney Houston during the 1990Super Bowl. He has taught at the Royal Dutch Conservatory in The Hague, UCLA, Cal State Long Beach, and for 21 years at the University of Southern California. Clayton has served as the artistic director of jazz for the Los Angeles Philharmonic at the Hollywood Bowl, artistic director for the Lionel Hampton International Jazz Festival, as founder and artistic director of the Vail Jazz Workshop, and as director of jazz for Centrum, Port Townsend’s Jazz Camp. The CHJO has existed 40 years and was founded by its coleaders, John, drummer Jeff Hamilton, and recently deceased saxophonist Jeff Clayton, John’s brother. The CHJO has been named the Best Big Band in America by both DownBeat and JazzTimes magazines.

Jeff Hamilton was born in Richmond, Indiana. He attended the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music and later studied with John Von Ohlen. Hamilton was influenced by Gene Krupa, Buddy Rich, Mel Lewis, “Philly” Joe Jones, and Shelly Manne. In 1974, he got his first big break playing with the New Tommy Dorsey Orchestra. He then joined Lionel Hampton’s Band until 1975 when he, along with bassist John Clayton, became members of the Monty Alexander Trio. In 1977, he joined Woody Herman and the Thundering Herd, with whom he made several recordings. In 1978, he joined the L.A.4, eventually recording six albums. From 1983 to 1987, Hamilton performed with Ella Fitzgerald, the Count Basie Orchestra, Rosemary Clooney, and Monty Alexander. He began his association with the Ray Brown Trio in 1988 and left in March of 1995 to concentrate on his own trio. From 1990 to1995, he was a member of the Oscar Peterson Quartet. Hamilton has released several trio CDs, including the most recent Catch Me If You Can and Merry and Bright. The Los Angelous Jazz Society named Hamilton and his musical partner John Clayton musicians of the year for 2006. Hamilton has toured with his own trio, the Clayton-Hamilton Jazz Orchestra (CHJO), and Diana Krall. The latest CHJO recording, LA Treasures, was nominated for a GRAMMY. Hamilton has appeared on more than 300 recordings with a host of artists, including Natalie Cole, Milt Jackson, Rosemary Clooney, Barbra Streisand, Mel Tormé, Paul McCartney, Queen Latifah, Gladys Knight, and many more. He is a four-time winner of the Modern Drummer magazine Readers Poll. In 2014, Hamilton was inducted into The Jazz Cruise Hall of Fame. Along with John and Gerald Clayton, Hamilton was the 2017 Monterey Jazz Festival artist-in-residence and recipient of the 2018 Louis Armstrong award from the Sarasota Jazz Society. He currently focuses on performing with The Jeff Hamilton Trio, CHJO, and Akiko Tsuruga in an organ trio.

Brent Wallarab is David N. Baker Professor of Jazz Studies and professor of music in jazz studies at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music. Wallarab’s professional accomplishments as trombonist and arranger include work with Ray Charles, Bobby Short, Bill Russo and the Chicago Jazz Orchestra, Wynton Marsalis and the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, The American Pianists Association, and over a decade as lead trombonist with the Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra and as specialist in jazz for the Smithsonian Institution. His own work as bandleader and arranger has earned multiple four- and five-star reviews in publications including DownBeat, All About Jazz, Jazz Times, Jazziz, and international publications including The London Times. The Buselli-Wallarab Jazz Orchestra release Basically Baker: The Big Band Music of David Baker was listed in DownBeat’s Best Albums of the Decade issue, and their release of The Gennett Suite won the German Record Critics Award. Wallarab was arranger, conductor, and music director for the Emmy Award-winning TV production Wes Montgomery at 100, featuring guitarist Dave Stryker and a studio orchestra of Jacobs School students. His most recent release Stryker with Strings, spent 20 weeks in the top five international radio charts. He is a Grammy voting member of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences and was inducted into the Indianapolis Jazz Hall of Fame in 2017.

Robert Cozma is a Romanian jazz composer, arranger, trombonist and pianist. He began his musical journey at the “Octav Băncilă” National College of in Iași, Romania. His passion for jazz led him to the “George Enescu” National University of Arts Iași Art (GENUA) where he majored in Jazz Composition. Cozma received an Erasmus scholarship and studied jazz trombone at the Hochschule für Musik in Nuremberg, Germany, under Jürgen Neudert. He graduated in 2019, refining his skills in trombone performance, jazz theory, and composition. From 2019 to 2021, he studied jazz composition and arrangement with Steffen Schorn. He also took jazz piano lessons with Rainer Böhm and Andreas Feith, two leading figures in contemporary German jazz. In 2019, the Sunday Night Orchestra in Nuremberg invited him to arrange Christoph Willibald Gluck’s “Almen se non possio” for big band. For the Sunday Night Orchestra he composed “A Special View,” inspired by Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony, to mark the composer’s 250th anniversary. In September 2021, he way invited by Sunday Night Orchestra to conduct a full concert of his compositions. In January 2022, he joined the NDR Big Band in Hamburg for the Podium for Composers and Conductors. His composition “Midnight Visions” was conducted by David Hveem. His impact in jazz grew in 2022 when he became a member of the Union of Composers and Musicologists of Romania. completed his doctorate in music at GENUA, culminating in his Ph.D. thesis, “Jazz Styles and Writing Techniques for Big Band in My Own Works.” Cozma is currently a teaching assistant at GENUA. He teaches jazz improvisation and composition.

David Brent Johnson began his radio career at Bloomington community radio station WFHB, where he hosted the weekly jazz program All That Jazz. He started working as a part-time substitute host for WFIU’s Just You and Me in 2002 and in 2004, created WFIU’s weekly jazz history show, Night Lights, which is now nationally syndicated. He has also produced several jazz documentaries for WFIU, including Bix Beiderbecke: Never the Same Way Twice, “Jump for Joy”: Duke Ellington’s Celebratory Musical, and a four-part history of jazz in Indiana. An Indianapolis native and IU alumnus, Johnson feels a keen connection to the history and current state of Indiana jazz. A writer who has been published frequently in local and regional publications, including Bloom Magazine, The Ryder, the Bloomington Independent, and Indianapolis Nuvo, he has won two Society of Professional Journalists awards for his arts writing and has also written for DownBeat Magazine and NPR’s A Blog Supreme. He is the 2012 recipient of the Al Cobine Award, given by Jazz From Bloomington for outstanding service to the south-central Indiana jazz community. Johnson lives in Bloomington’s Near Westside neighborhood, a short walk from the gravesite of Hoagy Carmichael.