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Saxophonist
and band leader 'Steve Semmel' is not from New York City.
He's from East Meadow a small Long Island suburb. Steve attended Binghamton
University where he received his Bachelor of Science Degree in...COMPUTER
SCIENCE? O.K. his daytime gig is computer programming, but he did
minor in music and played in the college jazz ensemble for two years.
Steve did a lot of theater in Binghamton, including many orchestra pit
gigs and a jobs as musical director of a production of "How to
succeed in Business Without really Trying" and band director
of "Grease." He also had an on stage role in a production
of "A Street Car Named Desire" where he played a wandering
New Orleans sax player.
After graduating in 1990, Steves' first job...a computer gig brought him
to, you guessed it Tampa Florida. Almost the very second after Steve set
foot in Tampa the local jazz radio station 'The WAVE' (remember the old
102.5) suddenly died and became 'The Point' - light rock. Not a good sign
for anyone coming into town looking to play jazz gigs, but hey, life's
gotta go on.
In 1992 Steve was one of the founding members of 'Filet of Soul'. He spent
three years playing in that band and then moved on to putting together
an instrumental jazz group.
Steve has had the honor and privilege of performing locally with House
of Trouble, The Midnight Brass, Belinda Womack and Kool Reflections, Ron
Witherspoon, Quency Jennings, Mama Ruiz, Telegraph Road, Taxi, and Shawn
Brown. Steve has also performed with national jazz artists Frank Foster,
Bob Mintzer, Randy Brecker, Glen Drews and Rick Botari. His sax playing
can be found on an album with Marc Egan and Dan Gottlieb of the original
Pat Metheny Group.
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