Directors

Brian Drye plays trombone and piano and lives in Brooklyn, NY.   Brian has toured Japan, Eastern and western Europe, Turkey and throughout the US.  He performs regularly with The Four Bags and his own group Bizingas.  Additionally he has performed with Frank London of the Klezmatics, John Hollenbeck, ABC Television’s Hit Series “My Kind of Town”, The Brooklyn Qawwali Party, Slavic Soul Party, Brazilian Forro Brass Bands, Nation Beat, and Clark Terry. He has also recorded and performed with many famous pop stars and big bands including Yo La Tengo, Arcade Fire, Firewater, The Tommy Dorsey Orchestra, The Four Tops, Dianne Schuur and Paul Anka. Brian keeps a busy schedule teaching improvisation, trombone and piano in the NYC area and is a partner in the Creative Music Workshop. He has served as Director of Jazz at the JCC in Tenafly NJ and as faculty at the CPSM Jazz Program at Queens College.

Allyssa Lamb began teaching children at the age of 16, and has been teaching in New York since 1999. Although she now focuses mainly on piano pedagogy, she has taught a range of instruments, including piano, voice, guitar, electric bass, violin and accordion. Allyssa has a degree in music from The Colorado College, and has studied extensively in the following areas: classical and jazz piano, classical and jazz voice, violin and guitar. She is the bandleader and singer for the group Las Rubias del Norte, which plays regularly in New York and throughout the United States, Canada and Europe. She has performed with Dan Zanes and Friends, the New Music Ensemble, the New York Choral Society, and she has composed and performed music for the Holderness Theater Company.