Chuck Owen ('76), Distinguished University Professor of Jazz Studies at the University of South Florida and founding and artistic director of the USF Center for Jazz Composition, is the recipient of a prestigious Guggenheim Fellowship for 2009. The award will support his work to compose a Double Concerto for Saxophone, Guitar and Orchestra. He plans to record the work as part of a CD that will include other compositions and arrangements for orchestra.

In August, Owen and the Jazz Surge, the resident jazz orchestra at the Center for Jazz Composition, released The Comet's Tail: Playing the Compositions of Michael Brecker (MAMA Records). The CD pays homage to the compositions of the celebrated saxophonist, who died in 2007, and features some of his longtime collaborators as guest artists.