Mission

Redwood Jazz Alliance wants more jazz in Humboldt County, more traveling artists coming our way, more performances in our venues, and more colloquy between well-known players and composers and local students and musicians.

Since 2006, the RJA has hosted musicians from across the country and around the world to perform in the Arcata-Eureka area and to lead workshops and clinics.

We’ve worked with local radio stations, club and theater owners, musicians, fans, festival organizers, fellow non-profits, and granting agencies to promote improvised music and to further develop the profile of an already thriving Humboldt arts scene.

From the beginning, we envisioned a future in which a visit to the Redwood Coast would be an absolute must for top-flight jazz musicians eager to experience our unique blend of enthusiasm for the music and hospitality for those who play it.

Board of Directors

Dan Aldag

is a trombonist and professor at Humboldt State University, where he leads the Jazz Orchestra and AM Jazz Band, coaches the Jazz Combos, and teaches courses in jazz and the history of rock and roll.

Michael Eldridge

is a musical omnivore, lapsed trombonist, and Professor of English and International Studies at Humboldt State University, where he teaches literature, postcolonial studies and cultural theory.

Eric Neel

is an Emmy-nominated journalist for ESPN, where he is currently Director of the Content Innovation Lab and Deputy Editor of Digital/Print Enterprise. His Ph.D dissertation (U. of Iowa, 2000) examines postwar idealism and American identity in the work of James Baldwin, Allen Ginsburg, and John Coltrane.

Michael Quam

is a poet, gospel singer, and retired Professor of Anthropology at the University of Illinois, Springfield. He’s also an inveterate club-goer (and, more recently, a jazz-cruiser).

David Stacey

is a trumpeter, barbecuer, and Emeritus Professor of English at Humboldt State University, where he (still) occasionally teaches rhetoric and composition.

John Clement Wood

is a musician, composer, aspiring novelist, doting father, and founder of Learning Music Monthly. You can hear (and buy) his music at Bandcamp and visit him on Tumblr.

Emeritus (founding) board member Thomas Fossier is a carpenter, cabinetmaker, designer, potter, pianist, and whitewater rafter. In one of his many former lives, he was a commercial pilot and fish-spotter in Alaska. He's now pursuing other passions and still listening to jazz--on his own time.

And board member emerita Loralei Saylor is a former database analyst with a background in amphibian biology. Before moving to Humboldt, she volunteered for many years with the Healdsburg Jazz Festival. She's still a full-time grandmother.