Pittsburgh native Shawn Purcell is a guitarist, composer, arranger, bandleader, and educator living in the Washington, DC area.  He is the guitarist with the U.S. Navy Commodores. He is a member of the Alan Baylock Jazz Orchestra, the Steve Fidyk Parlor Project, and is the former guitarist for the USAF Airmen of Note. Shawn serves as adjunct professor of jazz studies at Towson University. He holds a Doctor of Musical Arts  degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and has degrees form Duquesne University and Middle Tennessee State.