Hafez Modirzadeh, tenor saxophonist and composer, has recorded for dozens of jazz and world music releases over the past two decades, and has worked both locally and internationally with many leading creative musicians in his field, including Fred Ho, Omar Sosa, Don Cherry and Peter Apfelbaum, Zakir Hussein and Mark Izu, Steve Lacy and Anthony Brown.
After completing a doctorate degree for Wesleyan University in an original area of study he calls "chromodal", Modirzadeh moved from New York City back to the Bay Area, where in 1998, he joined the faculty at San Francisco State University to create and co-direct two new programs: one in World Music and Dance, and another in Jazz and World Music Studies.
The recipient of two NEA Jazz Fellowships (1989 and 91) resulted in Modirzadeh's composing of the first Persian-American Jazz Suite ("The Peoples' Blues"---available on XDot25, 1996), and Afro-Persian Jazz Ballet ("The Mystery of Sama"---available on Asian Improv Records, 1998). The most recent of his four solo CD releases, "Dandelion", features a quartet including Akira Tana on drums, Art Hirahara on piano, and John Wiitala on bass.
Dr. Modirzadeh has also published works on Persian Traditional Music (1986), John Coltrane and Chinese Cyclic Theory (2001), as well as his own cross-cultural research, including the concept of Aural Archetype(2002), and an original approach called "Chromodal Discourse" (1992-).