biography.

Lee “Sparky” Thomason is a trumpet player, composer, arranger, and educator from Rockdale, Texas. A frequent performer in Austin, Temple, and Waco, he is currently playing with the Temple Jazz Orchestra, the Tonic Big Band and Small Group, the N.O.W. (New Original Works) Jazz Orchestra, Duck Soup, and the Urban Achievers Brass Band, and subbing with anybody else whenever the phone rings. He has been arranging and composing big band jazz charts for the past thirty years. His charts have been performed by numerous high school, college, and, professional bands all over Texas and Utah, where Thomason had lived for seven years.

​He has arranged charts for the Latin groups Mambo Jumbo, Latin Breed, Gilbert Alba and, the Super City Band. Thomason wrote and performed his first full orchestra arrangement of "Someone To Watch Over Me" four years ago with the Temple Symphony Orchestra and wrote his first concert band piece,"In the Days of Royal and Old" as a tribute to his high school band, the Big Blue Band from Tigerland of Rockdale, TX. He has written jazz arrangements for trumpet player Keith Fiala, Austin-based jazz trombone group, the Jazzbonez, and a brass quintet arrangement of his own tune, "Ludis Blues" for the brass quintet, the Brass Connection. Thomason has also recently began writing music for the British brass ensembles, as well.

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