The Trombone Shorty Foundation was established in 2011 by Troy “Trombone Shorty” Andrews, with Bill Taylor serving as executive director since its inception, to inspire the next generation of talented youth through music education, instruction, mentorship, and performance. The Foundation launched the Trombone Shorty Academy in January 2013 in partnership with the New Orleans Center for the Gulf South at Tulane University, targeting musically gifted, underserved New Orleans high school students.
The model is deliberate and personal: following the path that led to Trombone Shorty’s own success, the Academy is based on Danny Barker’s Fairview Baptist Church Brass Band program — the same band-room mentorship that shaped a generation of New Orleans players. In the Academy’s early years at Tulane’s Dixon Hall, Tulane artist-in-residence Donald Harrison Jr. served as music director and pianist Jesse McBride was picked to teach the first classes.
“But before you can understand how much music means to me, you have to know how important it is to my hometown, my greatest inspiration.”
— Troy “Trombone Shorty” Andrews, on the Trombone Shorty Foundation site
Today the Academy runs at the George and Joyce Wein Jazz and Heritage Center as a free, after-school program for youth ages 12 to 18 (8th through 12th grade), with students auditioning for a place. Enrolled students get hands-on ensemble instruction with consistent feedback and coaching from Artist Educators — full-time working musicians who teach the contemporary brass-band sound from the inside. Lead instructor Julian Gosin and instructors including Glenn Hall (Rebirth Brass Band, and Troy’s younger cousin) and Erion Williams (The Soul Rebels) coach the students, and the Academy brings in guest instructors like the all-female Original Pinettes Brass Band.
The Academy goes beyond the charts. The Fredman Music Business Institute, made possible by longtime Tulane supporters Andrew and Kerin Fredman, began music business classes in January 2014 covering recording, production, marketing, and event organization — with the final class project involving production of the annual Shorty Fest, the Foundation’s benefit concert. Students also get a music business and life roadmap that most young musicians never get, and the Academy’s more tenured students travel for an annual class trip to learn from professional musicians and industry professionals across the U.S. By honoring the New Orleans tradition of “playing it forward,” the Foundation is making sure the city’s musical heritage is still being carried when today’s twelve-year-olds are headlining.
