About our Director

Dave Robinson has directed the Capital Focus Jazz Band since its formation in 1988.  He is an active jazz performer, historian, and educator.  On trumpet, cornet, bass trumpet, valve trombone, and vocals, he has performed and toured with the top traditional and swing bands in the Washington DC area, and he currently leads the Conservatory Classic Jazz Band.  Dave was Adjunct Professor of Music at George Mason University, where he directed the Mason Traditional Jazz Ensemble. He is the founder of the Traditional Jazz Educators Network and the Jazz Education Network Traditional Jazz Society, is Past President of the American Federation of Jazz Societies, and has produced the Smithsonian's Jazz Concert Series.  Dave helped to launch the Teagarden Jazz Festival (for young trad jazz ensembles) in Sacramento, where he served as clinician, lecturer and adjudicator, and he also has served on the faculties of the Teagarden Jazz Camp in the Sierra Nevada mountains, the National Jazz Workshop at Shenandoah University, and Traditions Week at McDaniel College, as well as on the mentor teams of the Jazz Education Network and the National Association for Music Education.  He has also served as a jazz instructor at Washington College, and has lectured and conducted jazz workshops extensively across the country. Dave hosted "The French Quarter" on XM Satellite Radio for three years, drawn from his huge archive of trad jazz recordings, and currently hosts “Jazz Gumbo” on WKHS-FM.  He produced the acclaimed Traditional Jazz Curriculum Kit, distributed nationally in partnership with the Smithsonian Institution, the Jazz Education Network, the National Endowment for the Arts, and various foundations. Dave has served as President of The Mainstay, a nonprofit music venue in Maryland.