As a professional performer and ethnomusicologist, Andrew Connell plays saxophone and clarinet in ensembles ranging from jazz to classical chamber music to Brazilian chorinho. He studied improvisation and arranging with Ray Brown, clarinet with Rosario Mazzeo, Janet Averett, and Fred Ormand, and saxophone with Don Sinta. He has played with the Santa Cruz, Monterey, and Toledo Symphonies, and has appeared at the Monterey, Montreux–Detroit, and San Francisco jazz festivals, as well as Spoleto Festival USA. In addition, Connell has performed with a wide range of artists including Luciano Pavarotti, Dave Leibman, and Lou Rawls, and has recorded for the Musical Heritage Society, Intrada, Adventure Music, Earthbeat! Traveler, and Acoustic Levitation labels. On faculty at James Madison University, Connell is an ethnomusicologist whose primary research is in Brazilian popular instrumental music, focusing on issues of identity and musical globalization.