"James Tenney was born in 1934 in Silver City, New Mexico, and grew up in Arizona and Colorado, where he received his early training as a pianist and composer. He attended the University of Denver, the Juilliard School of Music, Bennington College (Bachelor's degree 1958), and the University of Illinois (Master's degree 1961). His teachers and mentors have included Eduard Steuermann, Chou Wen-Chung, Lionel Nowak, Carl Ruggles, Lejaren Hiller, Kenneth Gaburo, Edgard Varèse, Harry Partch, and John Cage.

A performer as well as a composer and theorist, Tenney was co-founder and conductor of the Tone Roads Chamber Ensemble in New York City (1963-70). He was a pioneer in the field of electronic and computer music, working with Max Mathews and others at the Bell Telephone Laboratories in the early 1960s to develop programs for computer sound-generation and composition. He has written works for a variety of media, both instrumental and electronic, many of them using alternative tuning systems.

Tenney is the author of several articles on musical acoustics, computer music, and musical form and perception, as well as two books: META + HODOS: A Phenomenology of 20th-Century Musical Materials and an Approach to the Study of Form (1961; Frog Peak, 1988) and A History of 'Consonance' and 'Dissonance' (Excelsior, 1988). He has received grants and awards from the National Science Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Ontario Arts Council, the Canada Council, the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, the Fromm Foundation, the Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst, and the Jean A. Chalmers Foundation.

Tenney returned to the California Institute of the Arts in the fall of 2000 to take the Roy E. Disney Family Chair in Musical Composition, having taught there at its beginnings in the early 1970s. He has also been on the faculties of at the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn, the University of California at Santa Cruz and at York University in Toronto where he was named Distinguished Research Professor in 1994.

James Tenney's music is published by Sonic Art Editions (Baltimore) and the Canadian Music Centre, and is also distributed by Frog Peak (Lebanon, New Hampshire). Recordings are available from Artifact, col legno, CRI, Hat[now]ART, Koch International, Mode, Musicworks, Nexus, oodiscs, SYR, Toshiba EMI, and New World, among others."

"William Lane performs as a soloist, orchestral player and chamber musician all over Australasia, Asia, Europe and North America. Recipient of a number of large scholarships and prize winner at various international competitions, he studied under Jan Sedivka (Australia), Bruno Giuranna (Italy) and Garth Knox (France), as well as in Germany at the International Ensemble Modern Akademie and in Switzerland at the Lucerne Festival Academy.

William was Violist in the Hong Kong Philharmonic (2008-2010), Principal Viola of Ensemble Resonanz (Hamburg/ Germany, 2007-2008), as well as working on a freelance basis with Ensemble Modern (Frankfurt, 2006-2007), the SMASH Ensemble (Salamanca/ Spain, 2008) and as a guest with the Lucerne Festival Strings (Swizerland, 2014). As an orchestral musician he has worked as Principal Viola with the Australian Youth Orchestra and casual player with the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra.

As a new music advocate, William is Artistic Director, Violist and Founder of the Hong Kong New Music Ensemble (www.hknme.org) and Director of its educational wing, The Modern Academy (www.hknme.org/themodernacademy). "

"Francesco Dillon (b.Turin, 1973) already has a brilliant international career to his credit, characterised by the originality and variety of the repertoire that he has embraced. As a soloist he has performed on such prestigious concert stages as the Konzerthaus in Vienna, the Muziekgebouw in Amsterdam, the Berlin Philharmonie, the Herkulessaal of Munich, the Laeiszhalle in Hamburg, the Jordan Hall in Boston and the Colon Theatre of Buenos Aires, with such orchestras as the Italian National Radio Orchestra (RAI), the Southwest Radio Symphony Orchestra of Stuttgart, the Radio Symphony Orchestra of Vienna, the Orchestra of the Colon Theatre, Ensemble Resonanz, Oulu Sinfonia Finland, and the Tuscany Regional Orchestra (ORT). Most recently he made an acclaimed debut with the Philharmonic Orchestra of La Scala, Milan, conducted by Susanna Mallki.

Having graduated in Florence under the guidance of Andrea Nannoni, he continued his studies with Anner Bijlsma, Mario Brunello, David Geringas and Mstislav Rostropovich, thereafter studying composition with Salvatore Sciarrino.

In 1993 he was one of the founders of the Quartetto Prometeo, a chamber group of international acclaim and winner of numerous prizes (Prague Spring, ARD Munich, Bordeaux) and recently honoured with the Leone d'Argento award of the Biennale Musica of Venice. Dillon is also a stable member of the Alter Ego ensemble which is regularly invited to the major contemporary music festivals around the world. His passion for chamber music has led to performances with musicians such as Irvine Arditti, Mario Brunello, Giuliano Carmignola, Piero Farulli, David Geringas, Veronika Hagen, Alexander Lonquich, Enrico Pace, Jean-Guihen Queyras.

The profound interest in contemporary music which he has always cultivated has led to solid collaborations with the major composers of our time: Gavin Bryars, Ivan Fedele, Luca Francesconi, Stefano Gervasoni, Philip Glass, Vinko Globokar, Sofija Gubaidulina, Jonathan Harvey, Toshio Hosokawa, Giya Kancheli, Alexander Knaifel, Helmut Lachenmann, David Lang, Alvin Lucier, Arvo Pärt, Henri Pousseur, Steve Reich, Fausto Romitelli, Kaija Saariaho, Salvatore Sciarrino and with cult experimental musicians such as Matmos, and Pansonic, William Basinsky and John Zorn.

Dillon's performances have been transmitted by such important broadcasters as the BBC, RAI, ARD, Radio France, ORF, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and WDR. He has recorded for the ECM label, as well as Kairos, Ricordi, Stradivarius, Die Schachtel and Touch. He recently recorded for the first time, Variations by Salvatore Sciarrino which received the Diapason d'0r prize, and Ballatta by Giacinto Scelsi, both with the Italian National Radio Orchestra (RAI). As a duo with the pianist Emanuele Torquati, he has brought out three CDs of rare music of Schumann and the complete works for cello by Franz Liszt for Brilliant Classics. Along with his concert activity there have been teaching experiences in institutions such as the School of Music of Fiesole, the Tchaikovsky Conservatory of Moscow, the Pacific University in California, Untref-Buenos Aires, Manchester University. From 2010 he has been artistic director of the season of contemporary music Music@villaromana in Florence."

"Dario Calderone studied Doublebass with Massimo Giorgi, Franco Petracchi and Stefano Scodanibbio. Between 2001 and 2007 collaborated as solo Doublebass in various orchestras. Since 2007 dedicates mainly to the diffusion of music composed during the last 40 years. He has collaborated with a number of composers , among others Salvatore Sciarrino, Bernhard Lang, Louis Andriessen, Robert Ashley, Christian Marclay and Yannis Kyriakides, inspiring them in the composition of their works. His activity spaces from solo performances to chamber music, having been regularly invited by the major contemporary musical festivals. He plays with Nieuw Ensemble, NAP, Atlas Ensemble and Ensemble Algoritmo; in 2013 he funded together with Yannis Kyriakides, Ann La Berge, Wiek Hijmans, Gareth Davis and Reinier Van Hout the ensemble MAZE, a group deeply involved in radical experimentations in the field of conceptual composition.

He regularly gives masterclasses at the Tashkent conservatory and at the Amsterdam Conservatory. In 2002 wins the first price at W. Benzi solo doblebass competition, and in 2006 wins the stipendium price of the IMD of Darmstadt. He recorded a number of CDs for Stradivarius, Attaca records, Wergo and Unsounds. In 2015 will be tutor in the "impuls Academy" in Graz."