BIOGRAPHY OF SEAN WAYLAND
Sean Wayland was born in Sydney, Australia, June 4th , 1969 and resides
in New York now. He is well known and respected for his prolific
writing, and unique harmony and rhythm.
Reviewers have said:
“Music Pours easily from Sean Wayland” : limelight
CD review
“Superman plays for keeps”: Sydney Morning Herald
CD review
“Sean Wayland has long been something of a legend among
Sydney
jazz circles”: Jazzgroove
“But if you took the names of Brad Mehldau, Larry Goldings or
Joey Calderazzo, he (Sean) is a player of the same high
caliber”:
Mark F. Turner, AllAboutJazz
His was a musical family, his father's love of jazz enabled Sean to
hear the music of Keith Jarrett, Chick Corea and others as a young
child. His father's mother Muriel Cohen was a concert pianist and the
first Australian to perform Olivier Messiaen's Catalogue D'Oiseax
publicly. To this day Sean is still entranced by Debussy and Messiaen.
Perhaps intimidated by living up to his family's talent, Sean chose to
study the violin as a child. His interest in the piano increased and as
a teenager he fooled around on the instrument. The fact that he was
already an accomplished fiddler and had a busy schedule playing with
school orchestras etc meant that he had little time to practise piano.
In his final year of high school Sean met jazz pianist John Bostock --
http://www.johnbostockmusic.com
At the time in Australia it was difficult to find out about jazz and
John hipped Sean to the music of Miles Davis, Herbie Hancock and John
Coltrane. After school Sean spent a couple of years at University
studying Electrical Engineering, but the seed had been sown and he came
to realise that his calling in life was to be a musician. Sean studied
at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music in 1992 and 1993.
He has had numerous piano teachers including Mike Nock, Roger Frampton,
Judy Bailey, and Paul Macnamara in Australia. In New York he has
studied with Barry Harris, Kevin Hayes, Geoff Keezer, George Colligan,
Sam Yahel and Bruce Barth. While at the Conservatorium he received the
Jack Chrostowski piano award. In 1993 he was a finalist in the National
Jazz Piano Awards at the Wangaratta Festival. In 1999 Sean received a
grant from the Australia Council to study jazz piano in New York which
helped him to relocate there.
Sean has worked for a number of internationally renowned musicians
including: Wayne Krantz , David Binney, Madeliene Peyroux , Tim
Miller, Ingrid Jensen, Jon Gordon, Dave
Smith, Isaac Darche , Dan Pratt, Ike Sturm, Matt Geraghty, The
Dangit -Bobbys, Moses
Patrou, Jay Collins ,Cornell Dupree, Jesse Harris, Sheryl Bailey,
Gerald Hayes, Dale
Barlow, Justine Clark, Phil Slater, Jackie Orsascky, Steve Hunter,
James Muller and Steve Mckenna.
Sean has released over 14 critically acclaimed CDs, featuring musicians
such as Adam Nussbaum, Dennis Irwin, Seamus Blake, Chad Wackerman,
Steve Kirby, Alvester Garnett, Jesse Harris, James Muller, Jochen
Rueckert, Matt Penman, Donny McCaslin, Will Vinson, Keith Carlock, Adam
Rogers and Tim Lefebvre.
Sean has successfully toured internationally. He has performed in many
countries including U.S.A, China, Japan, England, Germany , Hong Kong
and New Zealand under his own name. And in 2004, with his trio, Sean
made the first instructional jazz DVD produced in China by foreigners.
As well as recording his own CDs he has appeared on numerous other jazz
releases including albums by David Binney, Elana Stone, Tim Hopkins,
Banana, John Mackie and Nick McBride and Luca Benedetti.
Sean’s compositions and arrangements have been recorded by
James
Muller, Lily Dior, The Jazzgroove Mothership Orchestra, Matt McMahon,
etc. Dale Barlow, Matt Penman, Gerard Masters , Brian Charette and Dave
Theak have
dedicated tunes to Sean as well.