Performer, composer, arranger, educator and arts administrator Dan Thomas has received countless performance awards, and has performed and recorded with some of the most influential jazz artists and pedagogues in nearly every state in the continental US, Canada, and abroad.  Thomas emigrated from his native Canada to the United States in 1993.

Thomas currently serves as the executive director of the Kansas City Jazz Orchestra.  The band holds post at the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts.  Prior to his current appointment he served as the co-chair of the Jazz Studies Program at UMKC’s Conservatory of Music and Dance with Bobby Watson. Thomas was the chief architect of a new model for jazz education which garnered national attention for the program and he led a team of Kansas City Jazz royalty.   Thomas’ contributions to education have been recognized with inductions into Who’s Who Among America’s Teachers as well as being awarded the Muriel McBrien Kauffman Excellence in Teaching Award (2017), given to one Conservatory faculty member, and twice recognized by the Missouri Music Educator’s Association.