Hello and welcome to the site...
Things are pretty easy to find here...concert appearances are listed on the Appearances page.
You can order CDs and DVDs directly from the site using Pay Pal on the Order page.

And...if you want to check out a few cuts from recent recordings please visit me on MySpace.
There are also links to a number of live concert videos there and connections to the music of many of my
colleagues and collaborators.


2009 has offered a number of highlights worth mentioning...

In February I was honored to take part in a presentation of of Meredith Monk's music
in an all day celebration and retrospective of her work at the Whitney Museum of American Art here in New York City.
She has been one of my musical heroines for many years. I performed that day in drummer John Hollenbeck's ensemble.
John is a member of Meredith Monk's touring ensemble and put his own spin on a few of her pieces.


In April and May I was in Europe for a number of dates with cellist Vincent Courtois and pianist Sylvie Courvoisier.
One particularly special evening was Vincent's presentation of film music he had written and recorded along with vocalist
John Greaves who joined us in concert at La Dynamo in Paris.


This summer I'll be working on a commission I received from Chamber Music America as part of their annual grant awards
for New Jazz Works funded by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. I'll be writing a new piece for "Different But the Same"
a group led by saxophonist David Liebman and myself along with bassist Tony Marino and drummer Jim Black.











This fall I'll be busy in Europe with drummer Bobby Previte's band featuring Bill Ware on vibraphone and Brad Jones on bass.
Directly following that I'll be touring with the aforementioned "Different But the Same" (Liebman / Eskelin).


















Back in August of last year drummer Gerry Hemingway and I recorded a series of duets which we are readying for release
hopefully by the end of this year. I'll post news as things develop. In the meantime you can catch a live video of Gerry and I
performing at the 2008 Hell's Kitchen Festival, right here in my neighborhood.





While we're on the subject of saxophone / drum videos you may enjoy this one...



As you'll see, I'm on the receiving end of a music lesson from young Nat Hervé-Constable (son of vocalist Jessica Constable).
He's a very focused young man and he certainly kept me on my toes. If I'm fortunate, perhaps he'll hire me in twenty years.





















AVAILABLE NOW...ELLERY ESKELIN with Andrea Parkins & Jim Black...One Great Night...LIVE!
In time to celebrate the band's 15 year anniversary(!) I'm happy to announce the coming release of "One Great Night...Live"
on hatOLOGY recordings. After many years of touring and recording, the planets were finally in the proper alignment for this live
recording. Having just returned from a stimulating and far-reaching tour of Europe the band did a stateside concert at Towson University
in Baltimore (my alma mater). The acoustics of Towson's recently built concert hall are fantastic and the band was firing on all cylinders.
And as fortune would have it there was an aspiring sound engineer on the premises who seized the opportunity and captured the whole event.

Some years ago I was interviewed by NPR (National Public Radio)
for a program spotlighting the great tenor saxophonist Gene Ammons.
The program has now been made available on the NPR website. Take a listen...


1999 European Tour Diary. Covering our concert tour of
France, Spain, Switzerland, Germany, Holland, Belgium and England.
All About Jazz also published this diary in their January 2000 issue.


40 West Transcription
Daniel Erdman, saxophonist from Germany, has transcribed
the saxophone part from "40 West" (from my recording "Jazz Trash")


Hometown Scene...
See concert listings for The Left Bank Jazz Society of Baltimore from 1964 to 1967...with photos!
Read an in depth article about the LBJS on the Baltimore City Paper web site.


more on Baltimore...
Sounds and Stories - The Musical Life of Maryland's African-American Communities
This site is a collection of interviews with musicians and people associated with
the Baltimore music scene since way back. Some of these folks I remember
well and played with. I think it's a tragedy that so many local stories never
get told and so finding this was a joy. I recommend starting with the
interview with Henry Baker and Reppard Stone. Henry Baker ran a club
called "The Closet" that I played at for years when I was living in Baltimore. I
met a lot of great musicians there. Bob Berg and Tom Harrell, Gary Bartz,
Clifford Jordan. I even got to sit in with Woody Shaw one night. Henry has
stories that go back to his days hanging with Lester Young and Charlie Parker.
There's also an interview with Ruth Binsky. Her husband Mike ran a club called
"The Bandstand", another place I played at. In fact, I once sat in with Pepper
Adams and Philly Joe Jones there when I was about 19.


All the News that's Fit to Print...
This site was mentioned in the on-line version of the New York Times.
Click here for the Times site or here to view it on this site.


Bobbie Lee & Rodd Keith, My Musician Parents!


Speaking of Rodd Keith...
On February 11, 2003 PBS aired "OFF THE CHARTS: The Song-Poem Story"
on the new series "INDEPENDENT LENS". The film explored the "send us your lyrics"
music industry and profiled my father Rodd Keith as well as some of the song-poets themselves.
I was in there too, being interveiwed about my father. See the PBS web site for Off the Charts.
The LA Weekly ran an excellent piece on the film which you can read here.
UPDATE: PBS has uploaded the entire documentary on youtube. View the film here.
Or view it here, via Hulu.com: