Wes Parker

Bio

Dr. Wes Parker is an active clinician, adjudicator, trombonist, and guest conductor who has worked with middle school, high school, and collegiate jazz ensembles throughout the Southeast. He has directed numerous All-State and All-Region honor bands in Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, North Carolina, and Tennessee, and is in demand as both a jazz and classical trombonist. As a Teaching Professor and Director of Jazz Studies at North Carolina State University since 2006, Dr. Parker directs multiple jazz ensembles, coaches jazz combos, and teaches jazz history and jazz improvisation.

Parker’s trombone playing has been heard in jazz ensembles and orchestras throughout the United States. As an active freelance musician, he has shared the stage with such artists as Aretha Franklin, Idina Menzel, Placido Domingo, Branford Marsalis, Ellis Marsalis, Michael Feinstein, Josh Groban, Regis Philbin, the Jimmy Dorsey and Glenn Miller Orchestras, the Temptations, and the Pointer Sisters. Parker performs regularly in the North Carolina Opera and Carolina Ballet Orchestras, the Chamber Orchestra of the Triangle, and is a member of the North Carolina Jazz Repertory Orchestra.

Under Parker’s direction, the Jazz Program at NC State has grown to offer three big bands and four jazz combos, has performed multiple times at the annual North Carolina Music Educators Association conference, and the advanced jazz combo will soon release its second studio album, For the First Time Again. His bands have hosted and performed with such notable jazz musicians as Bobby Shew, Jiggs Whigham, Wayne Bergeron, Jeff Coffin, Michael Dease, Terrel Stafford, Harry Watters, Chris Vadala, Bryan Carter, Marcus Roberts, Tim Armacost, and Arturo O’Farrill. The NC State Jazz Orchestra recently performed at The Midwest Clinic in December 2022, and was excited to be the first collegiate ensemble to represent the state of North Carolina in the 76-year history of the conference.

Dr. Parker in an Outstanding Teacher Award winner at North Carolina State University and has received a Citation of Excellence from the National Band Association. Prior to his appointment at NC State, he served as an interim professor of trombone at The University of Southern Mississippi, and spent time teaching public school in Mississippi and Oklahoma.
Dr. Parker holds a degree in Music Education from Tennessee Tech University, and both his Master of Music and Doctor of Musical Arts degrees in Trombone Performance and Pedagogy from The University of Southern Mississippi.