Donovan Mixon Author/Musician

      During the period when Donovan Mixon was a full-time faculty member at Berklee College of Music, he won an NEA grant for jazz composition. Five years later he moved to Europe for professional and artistic development.            
      The move abroad turned out to be a seventeen-year sojourn living as a freelance performing artist, clinician and college professor (Istanbul Bilgi University, University of Bologna), performing at major jazz festivals (Umbria, Monticello, Istanbul, Ankara) and as a clinician at educational institutions (BAU Istanbul; CEU, Budapest; Shanghai American School, China; School of the Arts Singapore).      
        In Chicago, he works as a teaching-artist with the Jazz Institute at various educational institutions. 
        Donovan completely understands what it feels like to confront ear training challenges without knowing where/how to begin. He knows the stone cold challenge of being asked to read or transpose music on sight or the panic of getting lost in an arrangement without the ears to find your way back.
         That's why he wrote his critically acclaimed text, Performance Ear Training published by Advance Music. 
         Donovan released four recordings featuring prominent musicians from Boston to Milan to Istanbul. More recently, he has recorded and released the single, 'It's Been Good' as well as the compilation full length CD, 'We Play When We Play' that features Trumpeter Eddie Henderson and Saxophonist George Garzone. Both can be found at Bandcamp.com. He also appears on the recording Free With Lee on Philology Records with the great alto saxophonist Lee Konitz. 
            He presently lives in Chicago performing in clubs, concert halls and festivals with his World Jazz Quintet and the GBME – Great Black Music Ensemble of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) of which he is a recent inductee. He has leveraged his legacy to help teach hundreds of students, and move closer to their musical dreams.
        As the creator and curator of his innovative 
concert series, 'Donovan's Garage' performs in collaboration with Chicago’s finest jazz musicians. He is a Resident Artist for the Jazz Institute of Chicago, an adjunct faculty member at Oakton Community College, teaches guitar and Performance Ear Training privately and works as a freelance musician on the scene.

His 2025 recording Finding Center is currently in production, slated for release in the fall.  

More information can be found at
donovanmixon.com
      
 

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