Lynn “Doc” Skinner

Lynn “Doc” Skinner has been part of the Jazz Festival since he arrived in Moscow as the director of music education at the University of Idaho. In 1972, Doc offered to help music professor and festival director, Rich Werner. When the Jazz Festival needed a new director in 1976, he accepted the position and served as executive director until 2007.

During his tenure as executive director of the festival, he brought some of the greatest jazz artists to Moscow including Ella Fitzgerald, Dizzy Gillespie, Stan Getz, Gerry Mulligan, Toots Thielemans, Ray Brown and Sarah Vaughan—and Lionel Hampton to the festival in 1984.

Doc and Hamp’s friendship was a major and inspiring part of the festival, focusing on education and cultivating the next generation of jazz musicians. His efforts over the years culminated in 2008, when the University of Idaho Lionel Hampton Jazz Festival received the National Medal of Arts, the nation’s most prestigious arts award, from President George W. Bush. In 2010 Doc received the Governor’s Awards in the Arts for Support of Arts Education from Gov. C.L. “Butch” Otter.