Blair Goins earned his Bachelor of Music in composition with primary study on tuba at the Eastman School of Music in 1985. Two years later, he was commissioned by the University of Vermont to compose a work for full orchestra in celebration of Martin Luther King, Jr. Since moving to Washington, D.C. in 1988, Blair has performed with the Monumental Brass Quintet, the Takoma Park Symphony Orchestra, the Modern Brass Trio, the Silver Spring Brass on the Kennedy Center Millennium Stage, and the Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra at Lincoln Theater. For four years, beginning in 1990, he was the tuba instructor and one of the music theory teachers at the Duke Ellington School of the Arts. Blair thoroughly enjoys performing, arranging and composing chamber music for a variety of creative instrumentations.