RYAN FINN, Youth Jazz Director
Jazz Combo Coach / The Jazz Project: Los Alamos — Capulin

Ryan Finn is the Program Director for The Jazz Project. Based in Los Alamos, he directs concert bands, jazz bands, and the Topper Marching Band at Los Alamos Middle and High Schools. Ryan is an active performer, playing trombone with several area jazz and blues bands. He also leads a jazz group that presents his original compositions, most of which are in Caribbean and Latin American styles.

Ryan’s interest in Caribbean and Latin music is rooted in practical life experience. For more than seven years, he  taught band, orchestra, jazz, and music theory at the School of Music on the Caribbean island of St. Lucia. He also performed with well-known Caribbean musicians such as Luther François, Barbara Cadet, Alison Marquis, Ronald “Boo” Hinkson, and Rob “Zi” Taylor. Taken with the sounds he heard in the islands, Ryan arranged and composed in a variety of local folk styles and has a portfolio of over 30 compositions, including full symphonic works, musicals, jazz band charts, and concert band arrangements.

Before joining our team as Director of Jazz Studies, Ryan directed the Youth Philharmonic for the Santa Fe Youth Symphony Association, growing the program exponentially over a four-year period. During the “COVID” school year, a time when most programs were dormant, Ryan was instrumental in creating a virtual concert series that involved more than 400 students nationwide in combined youth orchestra presentations.

Ryan earned his Bachelor of Music Education in 2004 from Loyola University-New Orleans and his Masters of Educational Leadership in 2018 from New Mexico Highlands University. He serves as the Vice President of Jazz for the NM Music Educators Association and is working statewide to help create an educational space and priority for jazz and improvisational music. Ryan was awarded the NMMEA Music Educator of the Year Award in January 2020; a year later, his jazz band was named one of the NMMEA All-State Jazz Bands. As a result of his many successes, here in New Mexico and elsewhere, Ryan is often asked to lead clinics with middle school and high school bands across the Southwest.

In his free time, Ryan Finn can be found hiking and skiing around Northern New Mexico with his wife Ellen, their three children, and their dog.