Sean Egan is a composer and multi-instrumentalist based in Saint Paul, Minnesota. He was born and raised in Hammond, Indiana, and received his Bachelor of Music in Composition from DePaul University in 1986.
His primary focus is clarinet improvisation. His playing draws on a wide range of influences, including Irish traditional music, blues and blues-based rock, modal jazz, and twentieth-century classical music.
He is the founder of Cumar, a live-music and dance ensemble which fuses West African and Irish performance traditions. Cumar has been supported by grants from the Minnesota State Arts Board, Irish Arts Minnesota, and the Metropolitan Regional Arts Council, and was chosen to be one of the Southern Theater’s 2023 performance partners.
He also performs with the Sonoglyph Collective, which combines spoken word performance with improvised music, the heavy metal/jazz fusion band Aaron Kerr's Dissonant Creatures, and the free improvisation woodwind quartet Ventu.
Egan’s experimental spirit and love for the creative interplay of ideas fuels his love of collaboration. Twin Cities artists and performing groups he has worked with include the hip hop dance company BRKFST, crankie artist Alisa Mee, poet D. J. Haliday, sculptor Pedram Baldari, improvisational modern dancer Erika Hansen, film-maker Mahdi Ahmadi, singer-songwriter Rick Risch, the James Sewell Ballet, and In The Heart of the Beast Puppet and Mask Theatre.