Trumpeter Michael Hackett is a leader in jazz education and performance.
Born and raised in Southern Oregon, Michael Hackett is an accomplished jazz trumpet player, composer, and arranger currently residing near Madison, Wisconsin. He is presently serving as Associate Professor of Jazz and Commercial Music and Director of Jazz Studies at The University of Wisconsin-Whitewater and is an active performer, clinician and adjudicator. Dr. Hackett career has been quite diverse backing up artists Aretha Franklin, Natalie Cole, Frankie Valli, and Perry Como and performing in jazz clubs across the country. He has performed as a member of The Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra and Vince Giordano and The Nighthawks, and his playing has been featured in national television and radio commercials as well as on many commercially available recordings. While in living in North Carolina he was an active performer in the region maintaining membership in the Piedmont/Triad Jazz Orchestra and the North Carolina Brass Band.
Michael Hackett’s first solo recording entitled “Circles” was released on the Summit Records label in 2005. In 2013, Summit Records released his most recent recording entitled “New Point of View.” A third recording, “Western Skies,” with a sexted co-led by trombonist Tim Coffman, was released by Summit Records in August of 2022. He is also featured in big band recordings as a member of The Buselli/Wallarab Jazz Orchestra and The Scott Whitfield Jazz Orchestra East
Dr. Hackett has served as an adjudicator for the jazz divisions finals of both the International Trumpet Guild and The National Trumpet Competition as well as for the preliminary round of the Carmine Caruso Jazz Trumpet Competition. From 2008 to 2014 Dr. Hackett was on the faculty of the Yellowstone Jazz Camp and has also served on the faculties of the Ohio State University Jazz Camp and the Jazz Arts Initiative Summer Camp.
Having received his Bachelor of Music and Master of Music in Jazz studies from the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, Hackett returned in 2004 receiving his Doctor of Music in Brass Pedagogy from the same institution in 2010. His principal teachers include trumpet studies with William Adam, Joey Tartell, John Rommel, and Ed Cord, and jazz studies with David Baker and Pat Harbison. He has previously held positions on the faculties of Butler University, The Ohio State University, Indiana State University, and University of North Carolina at Charlotte.