| Tony Gairo maintains an active schedule as a composer, performer, and educator of jazz, the saxophones, flute, and clarinet, jazz composition, arranging, theory, and analysis. Voted the 2004 Jazz Musician of the Year - Lehigh Valley (PA) by Pulseweekly Magazine, he is the leader of the Tony Gairo-Gary Rissmiller Jazz Orchestra, a 16-piece modern jazz Big Band whose repertoire consists entirely of his original compositions and which performs Tuesday nights at Indulge! Restaurant and NightClub, Allentown, PA. The band has been heard in concert at Foy Hall, Moravian College (2001, 2003, 2005), Bethlehem (PA) Musikfest (2005), Mayfair Music and Arts Festival, Allentown, PA (2004), Morrisville (PA) Jazz Festival (2005), and at the Deerhead Inn. Their debut recording, Treacherous, was released January 2006 on Sea Breeze Records. Since 1996, Gairo has been an Artist/Lecturer on the Jazz Faculty at Moravian College in Bethlehem, PA where he is the Director of the Jazz Combo and teaches saxophone, flute, clarinet, jazz improvisation, jazz composition/arranging, and jazz history. In 2004, he was added to the faculty at Muhlenberg College, Allentown, PA. Commencing in 2001, he participated in the BMI Jazz Composer's Workshop in New York City where many of his compositions for Jazz Orchestra were premiered and showcased. He conducted the BMI (NY) Jazz Composer's Orchestra in concert at Merkin Hall, New York in July 2003, 2004, and 2005. He has been a pupil of internationally acclaimed, Grammy-nominated jazz composer, Jim McNeely since 2000. Since 1996, he has been a contributing member of The Hoppin' John Orchestra, a post-modern original brass band centralized in Philadelphia, Pa. The band performs regularly throughout the Greater Philadelphia region. Gairo is leader and co-founder of The
Newdelphia Sax Quartet whose recording The Newdelphia Sax Quartet
contains many of his compositions and arrangements for the saxophone quartet.
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