Savannah's Mouthpiece

A JodyJazz Mouthpiece

Savannah’s famous mouthpiece is JodyJazz. JodyJazz is the company of Savannahian Jody Espinoza. But he was not always our mouthpiece he had another life first. He played his saxophone and was quite the performer with the likes of Mel Torme’, Milton Berle, Patty Page and Country music icon, Eddie Arnold, Louis Bellson, Don Alias, Lew Solof, Vic Juris, Harvie Swartz, Bob Moses, Dave Douglas, the Charlie Persip Superband, Rachel Z, Rolf Sturm, Rob Henke, and Mark Feldman. Espina has been a regular substitute in the pit Orchestras of Broadway. He has been a featured soloist on the soundtracks to three Mirimax films, and a documentary about Holland entitled, “Sex, Drugs and Democracy,” as well as Guiding Light, The Reading Rainbow, and television shows in Japan and Spain. He has recorded with Illuminatti, Brilliant Coroners, Feed The Meter, Splatt, and The Walter Thompson Orchestra, whom he plays with regularly. His tours include The Tommy Dorsey Orchestra and Illuminatti. He was a premiere performer before he became our mouthpiece.

.As if that was not enough Espina was the Director of the Jazz Department at the prestigious Hoff Barthelson Music School in Scarsdale, New York. In Barcelona he was Professor of saxophone, clarinet and flute, and the Director of the Big Band at the Aula de Musica i Moderna Jazz. While in Barcelona, Espina also taught at Taller de Musics and at The Lutier School of Fine Arts. He was a teacher of music theory and other things before he became our mouthpiece.
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He was a composer before he became our mouthpiece. Espina received a Meet the Composers grant for his composition, “The Universal Symphony”, in which he conducted his professional quintet and fifteen of his students.

In 2000 Espina started his company JodyJazz which makes mouthpieces for saxophones. His mouthpieces are state of the art and a much desired item for musicians. They feature exclusive patented designs, ground-breaking innovations and state of the art manufacturing techniques, each mouthpiece is individually hand-crafted in the USA. Because of the exponential growth of JodyJazz, which Espina founded in 2000, he made the difficult choice to stop teaching and devote all his time to JodyJazz in 2005.

He moved to Savannah in 2008, bringing two employees. His staff has since grown to over 15. He has also relocated his manufacturing and distribution facilities to the area. Now Mr. Espina is Savannah’s mouthpiece. He can be heard playing Latin Jazz at the Rancho Alegre on the weekends and he has been known to make guest appearances at the Savannah Jazz Festival and other local venues. So the next time you want to hear someone from Savannah Mr. Espina and JodyJazz are our mouthpiece of choice.*

*thanks to information on the JodyJazz website which was used quite liberally.

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Jody Espina and his band at Rancho Alegre