News & Events

Douglas Purviance, Music Program Faculty, Wins Grammy Award
Seton Hall > News & Events 

Thursday, February 19, 2009
by: Dena Levine

Photo by Kevin Winter/ Getty Images North America

Bass trombonist, Douglas Purviance, recently appointed to teach trombone for Seton Hall University's growing instrumental music program, was the recipient of a Grammy Award at the 51st Annual Grammy Awards. “Monday Night Live at the Village Vanguard”, a recording produced by Purviance, won the award for Best Large Jazz Ensemble. He is no stranger to the Grammys, having been also nominated in 1998 for another Village Vanguard recording.
 
Born in Baltimore, Douglas Purviance moved to New York in 1977 to build a career that is characterized by diversity and leadership. The next year, he became a member of the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra, now theVanguard Jazz Orchestra. He is also a charter member of the Carnegie Hall Jazz Band.
 
Purviance currently manages production, engineering and marketing of the Vanguard Jazz Orchestra recordings and oversees the band's financial management and worldwide tour booking. He is also executive director of Sixteen as OneMusic, a not-for-profit fund-raising entity for educational and multi-cultural initiatives.
 
He has scored and edited soundtracks for numerous film and television productions, among them The Winter in Lisbon (1990) and People Magazine's 20th Anniversary (ABC, 1992). He has toured extensively with Slide Hampton, Steve Turre, Dizzy Gillespie, and the Mingus Big Band, among others. Purviance is an active jazz educator and clinician on a worldwide basis, and regularly participates in master class tours.
 
Douglas Purviance is part of a growing roster of musicians who teach in the Seton Hall University Music Program. Also new to the instrumental music program are trumpet player Garth Greenup, principal trumpet of the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, widely recorded double bass player Dennis Masuzzo, and critically acclaimed clarinetist and conductor, Murray Colosimo, who is directing Seton Hall's newly formed Chamber Orchestra.

For more information please contact:
Dena Levine, Director of Music, Department of Art, Music, and Design
(973) 275-2450
levinede@shu.edu