Home » Jazz Musicians » Laura Dreyer

Laura Dreyer

Saxophonist, flutist, and composer Laura Dreyer is a vibrant, creative voice in the New York jazz scene. Her catchy original compositions combine lyrical melodies with Brazilian rhythms, jazz, and funk, resulting in an exciting, contemporary palette of sound with a strong rhythmic twist. A multi-instrumentalist, Dreyer performs both nationally and internationally with her Brazilian Jazz ensemble, Laura Dreyer & the Manhattan-Rio Connection, and is additionally in great demand as a sideperson. Audiences have heard her in the bands of such diverse artists as such as pianist Dom Salvador, Antonio Adolfo, Dr. Billy Taylor, Walter Bishop Jr., Mel Lewis, Robert Palmer, Nnenna Freelon, Lea Delaria, Leny Andrade, Portinho, Helcio Milito, saxophonist/author James McBride, Sherrie Maricle and the Diva Jazz Orchestra and, Mark Levine, as well as many others. Laura has recorded five albums as a leader/producer, including Mysterious Encounter (Lavasphere), Free Flying Bird (Sony/Piloo), Sax in the City (Apria), Vida. Arte. Amor. (Mayimba Jazz), and her newest release Água e Sol (Lavasphere). She is also featured on acclaimed Brazilian pianist Dom Salvador’s 2011 release, The Art of Samba Jazz, which received a Premio da Musica Brasileira award for Best Instrumental CD. Dreyer has a Bachelor of Arts degree from SUNY Empire State College, where she received a SUNY Chancellor's Award for Student Excellence, and was also a scholarship student at the acclaimed Berklee College of Music. Dreyer studied with noted music educators Andy McGee, Joe Viola, and John LaPorta. In addition, she took private lessons with saxophone greats Joe Henderson, Joe Lovano, and Hal Stein, composers Lyle Mays and Jim McNeely.

Awards

Chamber Music America Performance plus Grant 2024

Laura Dreyer: Dancing Through Time

by Katchie Cartwright
March 24, 2025

When something sparks her creativity, Laura Dreyer is the sort of person who jumps in with both feet and gets right down to business. A multi-hyphenate artist, saxophonist-flutist-composer-teacher-clinician, she has been serious about jazz since junior high school in jny: El Cerrito, California, across the bay from jny: San Francisco. “El Cerrito High had an award-winning--like state champion award-winning--jazz band that was really, really exciting," she explains. Flute was her first instrument, but she was happy to pick up a ...

Album Review

Diva Jazz Orchestra: "30": Live at Dizzy's Club

Read ""30": Live at Dizzy's Club" reviewed by Jack Bowers

by Jack Bowers
October 19, 2023

The “30" in the title of the superlative all-woman Diva Jazz Orchestra's latest album stands for 30 years, which, believe it or not, is how long the orchestra and its remarkable drummer and leader, Sherrie Maricle, have been up and running and making beautiful music at home and abroad. Among U.S.-based big bands, it would seem that only Count Basie, Duke Ellington and Woody Herman have had longer runs than that. Fast company indeed. So is Diva ready for comparisons? ...

Album Review

The DIVA Jazz Orchestra: Swings Broadway

Read "Swings Broadway" reviewed by Jack Bowers

by Jack Bowers
May 26, 2022

At the ripe old age of thirty (closer to a hundred in big-band years), the superlative New York-based, all-female DIVA Jazz Orchestra remains as frisky as a newborn colt, swinging up, down and around Broadway with abandon on its thirteenth album, a brisk and colorful tribute to the Great White Way that shines brightly from start to finish. The album opens and closes in a mid-1950s vein, raising the curtain with Steven Feifke's breezy, well-grooved arrangement of ...

Album Review

Laura Dreyer: Vida. Arte. Amor.

Read "Vida. Arte. Amor." reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
September 9, 2014

Life, art, and love are all intertwined in the latest work from multi-instrumentalist Laura Dreyer--a fourteen song collection that finds her plying her trade in Brazilian-based settings and contemporary scenes. For this album, Dreyer went the wholly authentic route, traveling to Brazil to record in Rio De Janiero. The music that was born in that sunny locale--a fusion of Brazilian musical languages, funk, rock, smooth jazz, and more--speaks to Dreyer's diverse interests; it also speaks to her ...

Recording

Saxophonist/Flutist Laura Dreyer Releases New Brazilian Jazz Album Featuring Guest Artist Dom Salvador

Source: Laura Dreyer
March 6, 2025

With roots deeply entrenched in both the cosmopolitan energy of jny: New York City and the passionate grooves of Rio de Janeiro, this group presents a unique sound that crosses borders and celebrates both cultures. The project delivers a rich fusion of sophisticated jazz harmonies with the rhythmic intensity and melodic beauty of Brazilian music, offering a new perspective on the global jazz scene. Laura Dreyer, a celebrated saxophonist, flutist, and composer, is known for her expressive musical storytelling and ...
read more

Recording

Mayimba Music To Release Laura Dreyer's Vida. Arte. Amor. - A Brazilian Journey

Source: Antje Hübner
July 24, 2014

Laura Dreyer, a native of the San Francisco Bay Area, has established herself as a vital member of the New York jazz scene. Always drawn to Brazilian music, the composer, educator and multi-instrumentalist created a “latinized" fusion incorporating elements of jazz, funk, and rock. Dreyer was a founding member and contributing arranger for the big band DIVA. In this capacity, she worked with luminaries Dave Brubeck, Rosemary Clooney, Dee Dee Bridgewater, Slide Hampton and Clark Terry, among others. Additionally she ...
read more

"Balmy bossa-influenced jazz-pop from a pretty San Francisco native whose sax and flute playing do indeed suggest she's learned a bit from Milton Nascimento and Gilberto Gil records...smooth, but not that smooth. The Beatles cover is quite tasty." - Chuck Eddy/Village Voice

"Every once and awhile an artist comes around to surprise everyone with the proficiency in an idiom naturally foreign to him or her. The saxophonist and flutist Laura Dreyer is one such artist. The Portuguese idiom of Brasil comes so naturally to her that she could almost fool even the most astute listener into believing that she is Brasilian." - Raul da Gama, Latin Jazz Network

Primary Instrument

Saxophone

Location

New York City

Willing to teach

Advanced only

Credentials/Background

Dreyer is very active as a music educator, having served on the faculties of the Jamey Aebersold jazz clinics, Cazedero Music and Arts Camp, Jazz Camp West, and the Friends of Music in Korea. Laura is currently a faculty member of Church St. School for Music and Art, the New York Pops PopsEd Program, Riverdale Country School, The New York Jazz Academy, and The Brazilian Music Foundation. In addition to being a clinician at high schools and colleges on a regular basis. Dreyer was a featured columnist in Saxophone Journal for five years, and contues to write for various music publications including Jazz Improv Magazine, and Sax on the Web.