Off The Record...
a little about me!
Steve Haines (double bass) has played with Wycliffe Gordon, Paul Bollenback, Joel Frahm, Ralph Bowen, Joe Chambers, Dick Oatts, Fred Wesley, Adam Nussbaum, Bob Berg, and Joe Williams. His first album as a leader The Steve Haines Quintet: Beginner's Mind (Artist’s House Records) received international critical acclaim and was hailed as "one of the best inside/outside records of the year." His newest album as a leader, The Steve Haines Quintet with Jimmy Cobb: Stickadiboom (Zoho records) is available at bandcamp.com. His most recent recording as a sideman is Chad Eby’s Broken Shadows (Cellar Live records), with Doug Wamble, and Jason and Branford Marsalis.
He is an associate professor and directs the Miles Davis Program in Jazz Studies at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. Haines holds a B.M. in Jazz Performance from St. Francis Xavier University in Canada and a M.M. in Music (Jazz Studies) from the University of North Texas. Haines' music is published at the University of Northern Colorado Press. Steve orchestrated and arranged the musical Ella: The Life and Music of Ella Fitzgerald. Most recently, he orchestrated Chopin’s piano Mazurka in A minor for full orchestra and jazz quartet. He is a recipient of the North Carolina Jazz Fellowship and was a semi finalist for the 2010 Jazz Knights Commission in New York. He has had a number of commissions to date for big band arrangements and compositions.
Steve has conducted All-State, All-Provincial and Honors High School Jazz Bands throughout United States and Canada, including Wisconsin, North Carolina, Arizona, Arkansas, Nebraska, South Carolina, Saskatchewan, Alberta, Ontario, and Newfoundland. “I feel honored to introduce people to the music of Duke Ellington, Fletcher Henderson and Count Basie,” Haines states. “The deeper the roots, the higher the tree”. He has big bands learn a tune by rote, that is to say, without written music. “These tunes tend to be the part of the concert that is most fun for the young musicians, because they don’t have sheet music to distract them… they are listening, and they concentrate harder,” Haines says.
Steve is also an avid clinician, having taught at a number of high schools and universities in the U.S., Canada, China, Moldova, Czeck Republic, New Zealand and the Ukraine. His topics tend to include the importance of listening, conducting large jazz ensemble, coaching small groups, composition and arranging, and giving bass masterclasses. He was the UNCG School of Music’s Teacher of the Year in 2006.
