"Michael Moore was born (1954) and raised in Arcata, California, USA. After absorbing music at home, playing locally and attending The College of the Redwoods and Humboldt State University, he moved to Boston to study with Jaki Byard, Gunther Schuller, Ran Blake, Joe Allard, George Russell and Joe Maneri at the New England Conservatory of Music, graduating in 1977. After a year in New York City he travelled to Europe for the first time in the summer of 1978 to play with Available Jelly, the musical accompaniment to the Great Salt Lake Mime Troupe. Since 1982 he has made his home in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

The early '80's found him working in the theater (Baal, Dogtroep, De Voorziening, Teo Joling, Mug met de Gouden Tand) and dance (Pauline De Groot, Katie Duck, Allessandro Certini, Shusaku Takeuchi and Virgilio Sieni) as well as various musical contexts such as Gijs Hendricks' Octet, Franky Douglas' Sunchild, Guus Janssen's Septet and Maarten Altena's Quartet and Octet. Later he played and recorded with the groups of Mark Helias, Gerry Hemingway, Sean Bergin, Maurice Horsthuis, Georg Graewe, Klaus Konig, Burton Greene (Klezmokum), Simon Nabatov, Dave Douglas, Myra Melford, Mark Dresser, Ig Henneman and others.

In 1986 he received the Dutch jazz award, the Boy Edgar Prijs. In '97 Trio Clusone was voted #1 acoustic group (Talent Deserving Wider Recognition) in Down Beat's Critics Poll; in 2000 - 2002 Moore was voted #1 clarinetist in the same poll. He was also voted winner of the Bird Award from the Northsea Jazz Fest in 2000.

Since '91 his activities as composer and performer have been documented both on his own recording label, Ramboy, and others including hatART, Palmetto, Gramavision, Between the Lines and Red Toucan. His playing and writing are to be heard on more than 80 CDs.

His activities as a concert designer came to the fore in '93 with a commission for YoYo Ma's Carte Blanche at the Concertgebouw, Amsterdam; a three day festival (Moore & more) in Bremen, Germany; Clusone & friends concerts in Italy and Holland, and a three-day Available Jelly Festival at the Felix Meritus concert hall in Amsterdam. In '94 he organized three evenings at De Singel in Antwerpen with Lee Konitz, Misha Mengelberg, Joey Baron, Marilyn Crispell, Gerry Hemingway, Kenny Wheeler, Mark Feldman and others.

His more recent activities include performances with his 'Fragile' Quartet, Michael Moore Quintet, Jewels & Binoculars - play the music of Bob Dylan, Misha Mengelberg's Instant Composers Pool Orchestra, the Magpie dance and music performance group, the Achim Kaufmann Trio, Benoit Delbecq, Oskar Aichinger (music of Carla Bley and Annette Peacock) and the Paul Berner band.

Michael Moore has a deep understanding of both the American jazz and the Dutch improvised music traditions, but his writing and playing are also influenced by music from other cultures. He has played Turkish music with Ogüz Büyükberber and Hüsnü Senlendirici, Malinese with Toumani Diabate, Keletigui Diabate and Habib Koite, Portuguese with Fernando Lameirinhas and Cristina Branco, and Brazilian with Rogerio Bicudo, Banda Mantiqueira and Paulo Moura. The musics of Sicily, Madagascar, Istria and Indonesia have also been particularly influential. He has collaborated with and been influenced by poets and poetry, dancers and other visual artists. Michael continues to write, improvise, play and prepare new releases for Ramboy and other labels."

"Wilbert de Joode (1955) is a veritable research scientist of bass pizzicato and bowing techniques. A self-taught musician, he has been playing the double-bass since 1982. He began working in groups that improvised within a jazz framework. Other musicians were soon drawn to his idiosyncratic style, and in the mid 80s he played in groups led by Vera Vingerhoeds, Armando Cairo and Ig Henneman where he further developed his improvisation skills. He came into contact with such musicians as J.C.Tans, Rinus Groeneveld, Michiel Braam, Han Bennink, Han Buhrs (Schismatics) and Ab Baars.

De Joode is currently one of the most active bass players on the European improvised music circuit. His individual style and musicality transforms the double bass into an equal partner in the most varied ensembles. A personal tone colour, exploration of the outer registers, quirky improvisations and the use of gut strings contribute to an instantly recognizable and intriguing sound.

The seventeen improvised pieces on his first solo cd Olo (distributed by ToonDist) show how rich and complex his sound on the double bass is."

"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."