by Janelle Kohnert
Copy Editor / Distribution Manager

You must be an incredible musician to have a German saxophone company ask you to endorse its instruments and then give you a $7,000 horn so that you can play it publicly.

SCC Music Professor Doug Reid has been teaching in the music building at Shoreline Community College since 1989, enhancing SCC’s musical offerings for the sake of its students.

Reid started playing the alto saxophone at age 15, just outside of

Chicago. “I had the privilege to study with a professional musician who was a saxophonist at Chicago’s Playboy Club and I studied with him for four years,” he said.

Reid graduated from North Texas State University, and moved to the Seattle area in 1980 to pursue a professional music career.

In the ’80s, Reid played with a rhythm and blues band named Annie Rose and the Thrillers. According to Reid, it became one of the most popular bands in Seattle at the time. He also played with the country band, Northwest Express, and lived in the bands tour bus while performing throughout the United States and Canada.

Reid has performed in local theaters including Bathhouse Theater, A Contemporary Theatre, Fifth Avenue Theatre, The Paramount and Empty Space Theater. In 1989, Reid was hired to play in a musical at SCC. That was when he met Susan Dolacky and Barry Ehrlich, who clued him in to an open teaching position in the music department. Reid applied for the position and became SCC’s improvisation teacher that same year, instructing one class a week.

Today, Reid teaches History of Jazz and Introduction to Music Theory. He also coordinates SCC’s eight small ensembles and directs the jazz ensemble; all the while practicing his own alto, tenor and baritone saxophones along with the occasional flute or clarinet.

Although Reid can’t force himself to pick a favorite class, he said, “History of Jazz is really fun because the students leave knowing a lot about jazz music and hopefully they share some of that with their friends.”

Reid’s love for performing music carries over to his love of sharing musical knowledge. He takes pride in “seeing students progress to a point where they play with a lot of self confidence.”

Reid still plays music professionally. He performs at local jazz clubs like Tula’s with some of the groups he’s in. Reid currently plays the alto, baritone or tenor saxophone in the Jim Cutler Jazz Orchestra, the Jazz Police, Magnolia Big Band, Nick Vigarino’s Mean Town Blues and his own band, the Doug Reid Group. “Being a professional musician today requires you to perform many styles,” he said.

Reid also plays with two Irish groups: English Paul and the Professor and The Raybone Experience.

On a regular day at school, Reid can be found in his office surrounded by several saxophones (some out and resting on their cases), a piano and a stand with sheet music. If he’s not in his office around 11:30 a.m., Reid might be in Room 818 conducting Shoreline’s Jazz Ensemble, with pencil in hand, interjecting references to “the key of Spanish affirmation—the key of C” between songs.

Bruce Spitz, Music Technology teacher and Reid-efining SCC’s music program Funkngroove coordinator, has known Reid for over 15 years. “He has a great sense of humor. It’s one of his best attributes and he uses it to demand his accuracy,” said Spitz. “I’ve seen him stop the band, ask the bass player if he’s completely lost, and he is, so Doug says something downright funny.”

Spitz also said that Reid is “a real dictionary of one-liners.” For example, Reid’s wife no longer attends all of his musical performances. In her defense, Reid tells people that “she couldn’t swing if she was hanging.”

Music theory teacher Jeff Junkinsmith, who has worked with Reid for 10 years, said, “Doug is one of the most respected musicians in town, but he wears that very lightly. It’s not something he parades around to people because he doesn’t have to.”

Spitz agreed. “He’s probably one of the top two or three saxophonists in the city,” he said.

Reid is also a judge for high school and college jazz competitions in Washington in his spare time. He judged three in December 2007 and traveled to Central Washington University to judge their jazz festival. In February, Reid will take a trip to North Texas State University to deliver a speech to students in order to help them understand the process of moving to a new city and becoming professional musicians.

In coming years, Reid plans to continue teaching at SCC. “I really like the diversity of students here at Shoreline,” he said. “I have some background teaching at fouryear schools and they’re much more insulated. We’re more down to earth.”

Reid hasn’t needed to overcome any particular obstacles besides the demanding practice schedule professional musicians need to have. “I believe if you have the passion and the determination to do something you can achieve any goal,” he said.