Faculty Profile for Tito Carrillo Jr.

Biography Section

Biography and Education

1996 B.M. Trumpet Performance - Northern Illinois University

Tito Carrillo is a trumpeter, composer, and educator whose music blurs the lines between Afro-Caribbean music traditions and modern jazz. Born and raised in Austin, TX to a Puerto Rican father and Mexican-American mother, Carrillo came to prominence in the mid-90’s in Chicago’s rich jazz and Latin music scenes, becoming a top call soloist, bandleader, and freelance trumpet artist. The Chicago Tribune describes him as having “acquired a reputation as a fluid improviser, doubly blessed with a warm lyric style and technique to burn.”

The artists he has collaborated with are as diverse as his skill set: Chicago heavyweights Willie Pickens, Ryan Cohan, and Geof Bradfield; Chicago Latin groups Chinchano (Juan Pastor) and the Chicago Afro-Latin Jazz Ensemble (Victor Garcia); big bands such as the Woody Herman Orchestra, the Chicago Jazz Ensemble, and the Smithsonian Masterworks Orchestra (David Baker); salsa legends Andy Montañez, Cheo Feliciano, and Cuban flutist Orlando “Maraca” Valle; jazz greats such as Kurt Elling, Claudio Roditi, Jon Faddis, and Paquito D’Rivera; and pop icons Quincy Jones and Phil Collins.

Carrillo released his debut solo album in 2011, entitled Opening Statement (Origin Records), to rave reviews. His most recent project Urbanessence (Origin Records), was released in October 2022 to much critical acclaim, and was selected as one of the top Latin music albums of 2023 by the North American College and Community (NACC) Radio Chart.

Tito Carrillo possesses a passion for sharing his knowledge and inspiring future generations through jazz education. He has served on the faculties of Roosevelt University, Northwestern University, and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where he served for 17 years as a full-time professor of jazz trumpet beginning in 2006. In the fall of 2023, Carrillo began his new role as Associate Professor of Jazz Trumpet at Texas State University.

He has taught at secondary and collegiate music programs across the U.S. and Latin America. Recently, he has directed his passion for teaching towards the launch in 2022 of his YouTube channel JAZZMIND, where he shares his expertise in trumpet techniques, jazz improvisation, and mindfulness for musicians. His long list of former students includes many who have established careers as both performers and educators and have won international jazz competitions at the highest level.

Teaching Interests

-Trumpet performance and technique pedagogy
-Jazz trumpet style and articulation
-Jazz solo improvisation for all instruments, with an emphasis on blues forms, swing concepts, ii-V-I theory and vocabulary, all chord-scale relationships and theory, pentatonic scale usage, diminished scale theory and vocabulary, slash chord theory, roman numeral analysis of standard jazz repertoire, the internalization of jazz repertoire, solo transcription and application, improvisation concepts and mindset, performance anxiety issues and techniques
-jazz arranging for small jazz ensembles
-Directing large jazz ensembles
-Directing large Latin jazz ensembles
-Directing small jazz ensembles
-jazz history

Research Interests

-Recording artist appearing on over 50 commercially released albums
-Bandleader, soloist, composer, and producer for 2011 Origin Records solo debut album Opening Statement
-Bandleader, soloist, composer, and producer for 2023 Origin Records solo album Urbanessence