Dan Davis

Lecturer (Jazz Drumset)

Dan Davis (B.M. 1989 – Music education/percussion – East Carolina University; M.M. 2012 – Jazz studies/performance – North Carolina Central University, summa cum laude).  Drum set studies with David Via, Keith Copeland, and Thomas Taylor. Percussion studies with Massie Johnson (UNC – School of the Arts), Harold Jones and Mark Ford (ECU).

In 1984 Dan received the A.J. Fletcher music scholarship to study percussion at East Carolina University.  He was the 1987 M.T.N.A.-Wurlitzer competition national winner in percussion and in 1988, won the E.C.U. concerto competition performing Paul Creston’s, Concertino for Marimba (3^rd mvt.) with the E.C.U. symphony orchestra.

Dan moved to the Raleigh/Durham/Chapel Hill area in 1990 and began a long association with many of the finest musicians in the region.  He is an active performer, educator, and clinician. From 2002-2005, Dan was a band director at the Durham School of the Arts in Durham, N.C., receiving the Claus Nobel Educator of Distinction award in 2005.

Currently, Dan maintains a full schedule of students and performs in many different styles of music.  He is an adjunct professor of jazz drum set, jazz history, and directs a jazz combo/jazz ensemble at UNC-Chapel Hill and East Carolina University.  Dan has performed with artists Joe Chambers, John Abercrombie, Paul Jeffrey, Claudio Roditi, Conrad Herwig, Lynn Seaton, Walter Smith 3^rd, Corey Wilcox, Eric Alexander, James Riggs, Andre Hayward, Dayna Stephens, Kate McGarry, Ben Allison, Gary Smulyan, Steve Nieve (Elvis Costello and the Attractions), Jiggs Whigham, Will McFarlane (Bonnie Raitt, Muscle Shoals), Six String Drag, and many other local and regional musicians.