Robert Luther, D.M.A.

Dr. Robert Luther maintains an intensive performing, teaching, composing, and arranging schedule in Kansas City and around the country.  He is the Associate Director of Bands at William Jewell College, where he instructs the Cardinal Sound Athletic Band and the Jewell Jazz Ensemble, and he also coaches the Wind Ensemble’s weekly brass sectionals and manages the College’s affiliated independent color guard, The Crown Jewell. Luther performs as a trumpet soloist and ensemble member in the Kansas City area and around the country, including frequent performances as a cornetist with the Fountain City Brass Band, America’s top brass band and nine-time champion at the North American Brass Band Championships. He frequently shares the stage with elite performers from around the world through this ensemble, and he has performed with top soloists and conductors including Christian Lindberg, Marshall Gilkes, Michael Fowles and Johan de Meij, among many others.

A passionate educator, Luther maintains a thriving trumpet studio, from which many of his students have performed excellently at regional and state levels in Michigan, Illinois, Kansas and Texas in activities ranging from all-district and state music contests to the National Trumpet Competition. He is also currently an assistant director of the Howlin’ Husky Marching Band at Blue Valley Northwest High School in Overland Park, Kansas, a position he has held since 2022, and he has worked with marching groups around the country in both visual and brass staff capacities for many years. Groups he has taught have frequently placed in regional and state competitions for the marching arts, and his experience as a performer extends to six years of DCI World Class competition between 2002-2008.

In addition to his teaching pursuits, Luther’s trumpet ensemble compositions have been frequently performed by groups from high schools and colleges throughout Texas, and ensembles performing his music qualified for the Semifinals in the 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2024 National Trumpet Competitions, including a finals performance from his students at Byron Nelson High School in 2019 at the University of Kentucky. His trumpet solo composition with piano, "Song of Myself," was featured on the 2018 album Mocking Midnight by Dr. Will Koehler. Luther has also adjudicated competitions at the high school and middle school level in brass playing throughout Texas and Missouri.