Local Musician Spotlight: Ben Markley

Ben Markley is a jazz pianist, arranger, composer, author, and educator who is active from Wyoming to Ft. Collins to Denver.

He has done so many exciting things with music.  His Ben Markley Big Band played the music of jazz legend Cedar Walton, featuring Terell Stafford.  Cedar Walton’s tunes are usually played in small groups but some have been arranged for big bands.   He played Cedar Walton’s music as well with a trio at the University of Wyoming with Erik Applegate and Chris Smith.  In fact, Ben could be considered an expert in knowledge of Cedar Walton, as he did a major project analyzing the construction of many of Walton’s tunes.

He composes and arranges big band and vocal charts and had a commission including the 2015 Wyoming Jazz Educators Al-State Jazz Band and the Wyoming Jazz Ensemble featuring Dr. Lonnie Smith.

He was honored with ASCAP Young Jazz Composers awards and was selected to participate in the Betty Carter Jazz Ahead program held at the Kennedy Center.

He has written a book entitled A Practical Approach to Improvisation – The David Hazeltine Method documenting David Hazeltine’s process of creating etudes from transcriptions.  The book was published in 2014.

Have we made him sound awfully academic and bookish?  Go hear Ben play piano!  He will give you quite a thrill!

Further information about Ben and his projects, recordings, and upcoming gigs can be found on www.benmarkleymusic.com.

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