A native of Pleasant Hill, California, Dave Martell received his AA Degree in music from Los Medanos College (1980); BA Degree in Music from Cal State University, L.A. (1982); a teaching credential from Cal State, Hayward (1983). He has been teaching music in the New Haven Unified School District for twenty-one years, where his bands have earned many top honors.

For 30 years, Dave has been professionally playing the trombone and has performed with artists such as Natalie Cole, Johnny Mathis, Lou Rawls, The Temptations, The Ojays, The Four Tops, Dionne Warwicke, Marilyn McCoo, Rosemary Clooney, Pete Escovedo, Bob Hope, Earl “Fatha” Hines, and Cab Calloway. He’s made appearances on the Mike Douglas syndicated television show with Woody Herman.

In addition to Dave Eshelman‘s Jazz Garden Band, Dave has recorded with the Black Market Jazz Orchestra, Ray Brown‘s Great Big Band, and with the Grammy-nominated Asian American Jazz Orchestra. He has over two hundred compositions and arrangements to his credit for groups as small as three to as large as two hundred musicians.