"One of Europe's premier free jazz bandleaders, pianist Alexander von Schlippenbach's music mixes free and contemporary classical elements, with his slashing solos often the link between the two in his compositions. Schlippenbach formed The Globe Unity Orchestra in 1966 to perform the piece"Globe Unity, which had been commissioned by the Berliner Jazztage.

He remained involved with the orchestra into the '80s. Schlippenbach began taking lessons at eight, and studied at the Staatliche Hochschule for Musik in Cologne with composers Bernd Alois Zimmermann and Rudolf Petzold. He played with Gunther Hampel in 1963, and was in Manfred Schoof's quintet from 1964 to 1967.Schlippenbach began heading various bands after 1967, among them 1970 trio with Evan Parker and Paul Lovens and a duo with Sven-Ake Johansson which they co-formed in 1976. Schlippenbach has also given many solos performances. In the late '80s, he formed the Berlin Contemporary Jazz Orchestra,which has featured a number ofesteemed European avant-garde jazz musicians including Evan Parker, Paul Lovens, KennyWheeler, Misha Mengelberg and Aki Takase. During the 90`s Duo work with Tony Oxley, Sam Rivers and Aki Takase. 1999 started performance and radiorecording of Thelonius Monks complete works, (all the compositions) with Rudi Mahall and his group "Die Enttäuschung"."

"Aki Takase ( ) (born January 26, 1948) is a Japanese jazz pianist and composer.

Takase was born in Osaka and started to play piano at age 3. Raised in Tokyo, Takase studied classical piano at Toho Gakuen School of Music. Starting in 1978, she performed and recorded in the US. Her collaborators included with Lester Bowie, Sheila Jordan, David Liebman, and John Zorn. Her first Euopean appearance was in 1981 at the Berlin Jazz Festival in Germany. She instantly became one of the most sought after musicians, who was touring constantly the main international jazzfestivals.

For many years, she has been working with her husband Alexander von Schlippenbach, as well as with Eugene Chadbourne, Han Bennink, Evan Parker, Paul Lovens, Fred Frith and others, and in duets with Maria Jo‹o, David Murray and Rudi Mahall.

In various projects, Takase has dealt with famous jazz musicians: Duke Ellington (1990), Thelonious Monk (1994), Eric Dolphy (1998), W.C. Handy (2002), Fats Waller (2004), and Ornette Coleman (2006).

In 2002, Takase recorded with writer Yoko Tawada. Takase had read some of Tawada's poems, and, as the writer reported, she "started composing melodies and settings for my texts. When we got together, I read my poems in the same way that I always read them out loud. Aki played, listened carefully to the poems, and started improvising." In later performances, Takase used more unconventional instruments when accompanying Tawada.

Since 1987, Takase has lived in Berlin."

"DJ Illvibe, who is known as Vincent von Schlippenbach, was born in Berlin in 1980 as the son of the freejazz pianist Alexander von Schlippenbach. Even today he is rooted in the jazz scene and occasionally accompanies him or other freejazz legends at their concerts. At the age of 14, Illvibe, who had learned to play several instruments during his childhood, began to deal with DJ-ing. As a Hip Hop DJ, he learned how to dance the records to his will, but he quickly realized that he wanted to get more out of the black discs than challenging scratching tricks. The long exercise units, in which other turntablists trained their dexterity, were quickly too desolate to him, so he renounced a career as a Battle DJ. He was interested in what was in the discs. As a producer, he discovered the possibilities of sampling and explored them in his numerous musical projects. He also performed with Lok 03, Carlos Bica's AZUL, Tony Buck, Christopher Rumble, and Infinite Livez alongside Lychee Lassi to improvise with them live, while simultaneously starting for his Hip Hop Crew Moabeat and the Berlin Dancehall Collective SEEED to produce the beats. Between 2000 and 2004, he was tour DJ for SEEED before all these different activities were bundled into one project. In 2007, DJ Illvibe, together with David Conen and Dirk Berger, founded The Krauts, a company that has been able to present numerous hit productions as by Miss Platnum, Peter Fox and Marteria. The Krauts are also characterized by the fact that they break the basic structures of urban music such as hip-hop, R & B, blues and soul and combine them with unusual experimental sound pieces. Therefore, Sampling is still the basis of DJ Illvibes work, even if at the end of the work process it is no longer about the individual sound chip. "Sometimes the sample is just an inspiration for a whole song," he says, explaining his approach, "and sometimes the sample is kicked out at the end and we just use what we ourselves have played. "

Still, it is the unusual noises that he is looking for on his records and which form the basis of his musical work. Whether as a producer in the pop universe, as a live DJ in hip hop or free jazz projects, or as creator of abstract soundtracks, which he creates for the transcendent Rap projects of Taktloss and his alter ego Real Geizt, Illvibe is and remains a sound tinkerer. A gold digger for the craziest soundtracks. A manic dis spreader. A vinyl user. A disc jockey."

"Born in Aachen, Germany, 6 June 1949; Drums, percussion, musical saw, etc.

Paul Lovens played the drums as a child. Self-taught, from the age of 14 he played in groups of various jazz styles and popular musics and from 1969 has worked almost exclusively as an improvisor on individually selected instruments. He has worked internationally with most of the leading musicians in free jazz and free improvisation, among whom have included the Globe Unity Orchestra, the Berlin Contemporary Jazz Orchestra, the Schlippenbach trio, Quintet Moderne, Company, and a duo with Paul Lytton. He has undertaken concert tours in more than 40 countries, is a founder member of a musician's cooperative and has produced recordings for his own label, Po Torch Records since 1976. He has worked with painter Herbert Bardenheuer. Despite very rare solo performances, and although giving occasional concerts with ad-hoc groups and an involvement in projects with film, dance and actors, Paul Lovens' main interest and work is musical improvisation in fixed small groups. In the mid-1990s these small groups numbered around 16, of which a few were part of a special selection, called 'vermögen'.

Paul Lovens somehow epitomises the free drummer/percussionist who is not there to lay down the beat and kick everyone else into action but to listen, colour, contribute, guide, and occasionally direct, the overall cooperative sound. In concert one cannot fail to be moved by his intensity and concentration and there is an overiding feeling that even the most random events are somehow planned in time. In this respect, there is a nice irony that on the Nothing to read CD with Mats Gustafsson, Lovens describes his kit as consisting of 'selected and unselected drums and cymbals'. Miking seems to be a problem at times with some recordings giving him undue prominence and others insufficient. Good recordings are Elf bagatellen, Nothing to read, Pakistani pomade, and ,stranger than love."