Glenn Ferris was born in Los Angeles on June 27, 1950, and is an American-born trombonist and composer who has worked in France since 1980. By his own account he chose the trombone at eight, after a Los Angeles Philharmonic concert, and he studied classical music from 1958 to 1967. In 1964 he began studying jazz with the trumpeter Don Ellis, who made him solo trombonist of his big band in 1966, when Ferris was sixteen. Four albums by the Ellis band carry his playing: Autumn (1968), The New Don Ellis Band Goes Underground (1969), Don Ellis at Fillmore (1970) and Connection (1972), and Ellis wrote the piece "Ferris Wheel" for him.

In 1972, on his account, the keyboard player George Duke of the Ellis band introduced him to Frank Zappa, and he played in Zappa's Grand Wazoo big band and then in his smaller touring band of the same year; recordings from the 1972 tour were issued decades later, among them Imaginary Diseases (2006). His biography also lists a stint as solo trombonist with Harry James's big band from 1973. In 1974 and 1975 he was in Billy Cobham's band for Total Eclipse, Shabazz and A Funky Thide of Sings, and he is the trombonist on Stevie Wonder's Songs in the Key of Life (1976). Other American credits from these years include Duke's Save the Country (1970) and From Me to You (1977), Tim Berne's The Five-Year Plan (1979) and a 1979 Los Angeles concert by the Vinny Golia Wind Quartet with Bobby Bradford, issued in 2017 as Live at the Century City Playhouse.

He moved to France in 1980. His first record under his own name there, A Live in Paris, was made with the Collectif Planète Carrée and issued by RCA Victor, and by his own account he settled in Paris for good in 1982 and taught at Nîmes, Salon-de-Provence and Nancy. Through the 1980s he recorded with Alphonse Mouzon (Distant Lover, 1982), the trumpeter Jack Walrath (In Europe, 1983, and two live volumes from the Umbria Jazz Festival in 1985), Tony Scott (African Bird, 1984), Martial Solal's big band (Big Band, 1984) and the drummer Barry Altschul (That's Nice, 1986). He was one of the trombonists of the Orchestre national de jazz under the pianist Antoine Hervé from 1987 to 1989, and appears on its album O.N.J. 87. Alongside the jazz work, Discogs lists him on dozens of sessions for French pop, Antillean zouk and African pop records, among them Véronique Sanson, Duran Duran's Big Thing (1988) and Youssou N'Dour's The Guide (Wommat) (1994).

Three long associations date from this period. With Steve Lacy he played on the saxophonist's records Anthem (1990), Itinerary (1991) and Clangs (1993). In Henri Texier's Azur band he recorded An Indian's Week (1993), Mosaïc Man (1998) and Strings' Spirit (2002); Mosaïc Man won the Académie du Jazz's Prix Boris Vian in 1998. And from 1988 he appeared on a run of records led by the Swiss trumpeter Peter Schärli, from Three Souls to Give (2021).

His own records of the 1990s used unusual lineups. The Glenn Ferris Trio, with the cellist Vincent Segal and the double bassist Bruno Rousselet, made Flesh and Stone (Enja, 1994), Face Lift (1996) and Refugees (1997). Palatino, a quartet with the drummer Aldo Romano, the trumpeter Paolo Fresu and the bassist Michel Benita, made Palatino (1995), Tempo (1998) and Chap. 3 (2001). In 2001 came Chrominance with Rousselet and the drummer Jeff Boudreaux, and Here & Now, the first record of BFG, a trio with the organist Emmanuel Bex and the drummer Simon Goubert. Here and Now won the Prix Boris Vian of the Académie du Jazz that year, and in 2002 the Emmanuel Bex trio BFG, with Ferris and Goubert, won a Victoire du Jazz as French instrumental artist or group of the year. His own biography adds that he was made a Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres in 2002.

The 2000s brought the prizes that mark his place in French jazz. (((Air))) (Sketch, 2003), a trio record with the pianist Giovanni Mirabassi and the trumpeter Flavio Boltro, and the next year Skin Me! (Naïve, 2004) by his Pentessence Quintet, with the tenor saxophonist Jean-Michel Cabrol, the pianist and organist Philippe Milanta, Rousselet and Boudreaux, are both on the Académie du Jazz list of best records of the year, for 2003 and 2004. X Actimo! (2006) followed with the same quintet, and Ferris Wheel (Enja, 2009) with Rousselet and the singer Ernie Odoom. He recorded Live in LA (Clean Feed, 2011) with the cornetist Bobby Bradford and the bassist Mark Dresser, and with the saxophonist Roberto Ottaviano on the tribute Forgotten Matches: The Worlds of Steve Lacy (2014). Since the late 2010s he has led the Glenn Ferris Italian Quintet with the clarinettist Mirco Mariottini, the guitarist Giulio Stracciati, the bassist Franco Fabbrini and the drummer Paolo Corsi: Animal Love appeared in 2018, and Soul Beautiful on vinyl on August 29, 2025.

Ferris remains an American-born musician, but his working life since 1980 has been in France: his leader records, his main groups (Palatino, BFG, the trio and the Pentessence Quintet) and his best-known honors are French.

Ferris came out of the Don Ellis big band and the Los Angeles studio and rock scene, and his own biography names Eric Dolphy's last record (1964) as the moment he committed to jazz. In France he became a trombonist who builds small-group music around his own tunes, which his biography describes as influenced by free jazz and by Ellington, and who has kept returning to unusual instrumentation: trombone with cello and bass, trombone with organ and drums, trombone with a singer and a bassist. A review of Ferris Wheel on All About Jazz heard his playing as close to the human voice and the mood as intimate and understated, and his official biography calls his approach "Trombone Attitude." His partners have ranged across the free and written music of Steve Lacy and Henri Texier, the Italian and French players of Palatino, and the rock and soul sessions of his Los Angeles years. His standing with French critics rests on the Académie du Jazz prizes of 1998, 2001, 2003 and 2004 attached to records he played on or led.