DAWN WEBER
Dawn's serious classical training started at the age of 16 when she got on a Greyhound bus leaving her home of Waukon, IA to attend high school in Winston-Salem, NC at the North Carolina School of the Arts (a performing arts high school for talented musicians, dancers, visual artists and actors).  There she studied with Raymond Mase (world renowned trumpet player and instructor at the Julliard School).  Dawn then went onto the esteemed Cleveland Institute of Music to study with Michael Sachs (principal trumpet of the Cleveland Orchestra).  After graduating she freelanced professionally and performed with many orchestras all over the country.  One of the biggest honors for her was being 1 out of 5 selected from the world to compete in the Elsworth Smith International Trumpet Competition. Currently Dawn performs classically playing everything from solo literature to performing with various orchestras and chamber ensembles.
Playing, singing, writing everything from classical to jazz, Dawn has a funky side to her as well.  Dawn got this versatility from playing in rock bands, salsa bands, and funk bands in college to help pay the bills.  She was the songwriter and front person for the popular group Urban Jazz Naturals (an electronic based group which played a variety of electronica including house music, drum and bass, down tempo and hip hop).  Dawn has continued the electronica side with Maurice Egeston in the Remix Project. Since then Dawn has freelanced with various jazz groups and performers not only on her trumpet but as a vocalist as well.

Dawn Weber, a tiny fireball complete with flaming red hair and a stupendous supply of energy, is a dancing, singing, trumpet-playing dynamo. Using her music conservatory education and real, raw talent, Dawn has been living a dream she's had since the seventh grade-to make a career for herself as a full-time musician.


Shortly after moving to St. Louis in 1997, she joined big band Vargas Swing and composed five original songs for their debut CD, followed by a coast-to-coast tour. But when-in one of those double-dog-dare-you moments-she sang "Take the 'A' Train" during a show, her bandmates were so blown away by her powerful pipes, she spent every subsequent show splitting her time between playing trumpet and singing. But Dawn-who's always up for something new-wanted to bring an innovative sound to the city.

In 2000, Urban Jazz Naturals was born, blending her impressive vocals and pitch-perfect trumpeting with edgy electronica to create a fresh sound of funky jazz mixed with groovy house beats. The band garnered success with its 2003 album followed by a string of hit singles, written by Dawn, which have been played and praised from Australia to Belgium and beyond.

Dawn's biggest challenge thus far has been playing a male-dominated instrument- "Can you name one famous female horn player? I have to work twice as hard for people to take me seriously," she says. But in case there was any doubt about her tremendous talent, Dawn was recently one of five people in the world selected to play at the prestigious Elsworth Smith Trumpet Competition in Badsackingen, Germany. She has proved once and for all that this petite pixie can seriously blow.

URB Magazine - Editor Review - How Can I?                                November 2004
Fancy flirting muted trumpet provides the intro and refrain to Dawn Weber's tiptoed vocals above Urban Jazz Naturals downtempo house grooves…perfect for a nighttime, poolside soiree, even in the winter.

Urban Jazz Naturals How Can I? Top 10 - Radio DJ Charts, BPM Magazine - January 2004
This 4-piece jazz/soul/house ensemble from St. Louis delivers one of the best tunes of the year... For the remix, JT does his thing with gentle keys, a fat bass, and muted trumpet noodling. A gorgeous and inspired jazz vocal from UJN Dawn Weber is slightly reminiscent of Erica Badu. All the lounges will be bobbin' to this one. Gonna be major!

URB Magazine - Jt Donaldson - How Can I? Review                                September 2003
The Urban Jazz Naturals are here. This track is currently being played on promo format to great response. The Urban Jazz Naturals hit the swing-era in style and upgraded it to present day. Featuring jazzy female vocals, mute trumpets, walking bass lines and electric keys, this song gives it all to you.

Playback Magazine - Local Scenery                                        March 2003
Dawn Weber is a star; let's not mince words. At the Urban Jazz Naturals CD release performance on February 8, this woman was completely, totally mesmerizing on stage. We arrived just in time to see Dawn playing the first number with opening act Vargas (who share two members with UJN), and it's a wonder the Duck Room didn't explode, what with ...Dawn's sexy, fiery energy on stage... This was the first time we'd seen Vargas, and Dawn, blowing up a storm on trumpet while vamping across the stage in a black mini-dress, was a sensation. The place turned into a raucous dance party for the UJN set...(with Dawn) astonishing all with her trumpet playing and stage bopping. The concert was a blast. . .

Riverfront Times - Rene Saller Spencer                                        Feb. 5, 2003
The problem with most makers of electronic dance music is that they're boring to watch. Sure, superstar DJs exist.. but they're famous in spite of themselves... Urban Jazz Naturals (is) the ideal gateway drug for those of the rockist persuasion. The popular quartet melds jazzy house, chilly lounge, soulful funk and twitchy electronica into a sophisticated but not overly cerebral sound that's all its own, one that gets crowds moving but also makes crowds watch. During the 2002 RFT Music Awards show, frontwoman Dawn Weber bounced around the Pageant stage like some anime Pippi Longstocking, blowing her trumpet and flugelhorn, singing and dancing and leaving long lines of thumping hearts in her pixie-dust wake. She's got style to spare ... Their self-titled five-track CD/EP is a slinky, sexy little thing, studded with deep beats and unexpected atmospheric touches, the kind of disc that slips easily from the car stereo to the party...


Biography - Electro Funk Assembly (EFA)

Electro Funk Assembly is working hard on finishing a full length CD.  And planning a break-out CD release party for this spring!  As for now we want to give you a little taste.  We have a CD teaser that has a few of the tracks available at our gigs.  We are giving them out in exchange for donations and forwarding the proceeds to humanitarian relief efforts in Haiti.

Dawn Weber's father was a saxophone player who gigged 4-5 nights a week.  He would sometimes have Dawn and her three sisters sing or play with his band, so she was performing by the age of 8. She studied jazz and classical music in high school at North Carolina School of the Arts and studied trumpet with Raymond Mase. With the orchestra she had the opportunity to play Carnegie Hall.  She went to Cleveland Institute of Music and studied trumpet with Michael Sachs.  When she moved to St. Louis, Dawn subbed with the St. Louis Symphony and started to play with the popular band Vargas Swing.  Vargas toured nationally and shared stages with other well known groups such as The Big Bad Voodoo Daddies, Squirrel Nut Zippers, and Indigo Swing. In 2000 Weber was 1 in 5 trumpet players in the world invited to compete at the prestigious Elsworth Smith Trumpet Competition in Badsackingen, Germany.  She then started playing with Urban Jazz Naturals, an electronica project which also toured nationally.  UJN had songs used in remixes by acclaimed by artists J.T. Donaldson and Demarkis Lewis that charted internationally.  In 2009 a career highlight for Dawn was  playing at the Super Dome in New Orleans with Peter Mayer.  Current projects include Treble Clef Palette, Dawn and the Electro Funk Assembly, Dawn Unplugged and the Dawn Weber Group.





Electro Funk Assembly
www.dawnweber.com

Blending and bending the best beats and melodies of the St. Louis music landscape

Christian Onken - DJ                Dawn Weber - trumpet                Mark Youngbauer - guitar
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Dawn Weber is one of the busiest and hardest working musicians on any scene, both on and off the stage.  When not touring, teaching or in-the studio, you'll find her playing somewhere in or around St. Louis most any night of the week, and in venues as widely varied as …

With TCP . . .        Beale on Broadway, Broadway Oyster Bar, Cicero's, The Deluxe, Venice Café . . .

With EFA . . .        Aqua Lounge at Lumiere Casino, Art Affair at Old Post Office Square, Blumenhof Winery, The Library, Lola, Mt.Pleasant Winery, Old Rock House, Sol Lounge, A Taste of Maplewood, Villa Antonio Winery, Washington University Quadrangle,

Dawn Weber Group, Vargas Swing, Urban Jazz Naturals, Mo and Dawn, etc…
At Home:
Blueberry Hill, The Blue Note, The Botanical Gardens, Crepes, Crown Valley Winery, Finale, Hammerstone's, Jazz at the Bistro, Studios at KDHX-FM, Marbles, Mississippi Nights, New Orleans Superdome, The Pageant, Regency Ballroom, The Ritz, The Sheldon Concert Hall, Soulard Octoberfest, Squires, West Port Plaza, University City Starlight Series, Whitaker Jazz Festival…
On the Road:
Albuquerque, Boulder, Carbondale, Dallas, L.A., Portland, Seattle, Tampa, Ft. Lauderdale, Houston, Key West, Minneapolis, Oklahoma City, Sackingen GE, Salida, San Antonio, San Diego, San Francisco…

Discography:
Vargas Swing - Fire, 1998          //  Urban Jazz Naturals - Urban Jazz Naturals, 2004
Mo and Dawn: The Re-mix Project 1.0 & 1.5 //  Treble Clef Palette - Demo 1, 2010
Comps: Hipsters, Zoots, and Wingtips Vol. 3/  Hip-O Records, 1999 - House of Blues Swings / HOB, 1999
How Can I ? / remix: JT Donaldson / Gallery, 2004  //  Demarkus Lewis / Large/Vista 2005

Dawn Weber has appeared live and/or recorded with a variety of artists such as; Frank Bauer,
Big Bad Voodoo Daddies Albert Castiglia, Mo Egeston,  Marshall Griffith, Indigo Swing, Peter Mayer, Kim Massie, Raymond Mase, St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, Squirrel Nut Zippers, Susan Slaughter,
Jim Stevens, Urban Jazz Naturals, Vargas Swing, Miles and Kara Baldus Vandiver . . .