Joel Spencer has been a professional musician and educator based out of Chicago for the past 20 years. In the following paragraphs you will find a brief desciption of these activities.
Joel has performed with a number of national/international jazz artists in Chicago and throughout the country. These have included such artists as Weather Report alumnus Wayne Shorter, jazz trumpeter Clark Terry, popular vocalist Michael Finstein(with the Chicago Symphony), R&B vocalist Cissy Houston, the Red Rodney Quintet, jazz vocalist Joe Williams, jazz pianist Dorthy Donegon, Count Basie Band, Chet Baker, Sonny Stitt, and Wynton Marsalis.
In recent years Joel has traveled to Europe appearing at Tivoli Gardens-Copenhagen, the Umbria Jazz Festival-Italy, and appearing summer of 92 at the North Sea Jazz Festival-Holland with Ellis Marsalis. Also. the "Red Sea Jazz Festival-1993" in Eilat, Isreal with a select group of Chicago musicians sponsored by the Ameritech Corporation.
Recording work in Chicago provides Spencer with a fairly busy schedule. This type of work ranges from commercial radio and TV ads to record sessions and movie soundtrack recording.
In 1991, Joel recorded several pieces for the movie soundtrack of :"In A League of their Own". In 1992 the soundtrack for this movie was released on Columbia Records.
In 1997, the CD "The Brighter Side" The Joel Spencer/Kelly Sill Quartet featuring Chris Potter and Garry Dial was released on The Jazz Alliance label. The cd is currently receiving air play throughout the US, Canada, Europe, and Japan.


Cuts from the cd can be heard on Joels music sample page.

Click here to purchase the Brighter Side as well as Joel's other recordings

Released in 1999, was Spencer's performance with Daniel Barenboim and a select group of musicians from the Chicago Symphony Orchestra on Barenboim's latest CD release: "Tribute to Ellington" on Teldec Records. In September of 99' Barenboim and the Ellington Tribute group traveled to Berlin to perform for the European record release for "Tribute to Ellington".
Joel currently holds positions in the School of Music at DePaul University/Chicago, Northwestern School of Music and the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Click here for Joel's official website