"One of improvised music's most in-demand guitarists, Mary Halvorson has been active in New York since 2002, following jazz studies at Wesleyan University and the New School. Critics have called her "a singular talent" (Lloyd Sachs, JazzTimes), "NYC's least-predictable improviser" (Howard Mandel, City Arts), "one of the most exciting and original guitarists in jazz-or otherwise" (Steve Dollar, Wall Street Journal), and "one of today's most formidable bandleaders" (Francis Davis, Village Voice). The Philadelphia City Paper's Shaun Brady adds, "Halvorson has been steadily reshaping the sound of jazz guitar in recent years with her elastic, sometimes-fluid, sometimes-shredding, wholly unique style."

After three years of study with visionary composer and saxophonist Anthony Braxton, Ms. Halvorson became an active member of several of his bands, including his trio, septet and 12+1tet. To date, she appears on six of Mr. Braxton's recordings. Ms. Halvorson has also performed alongside iconic guitarist Marc Ribot, in his bands Sun Ship and The Young Philadelphians, and with the bassist Trevor Dunn in his Trio-Convulsant. Over the past decade she has worked with such diverse bandleaders as Tim Berne, Taylor Ho Bynum, Tomas Fujiwara, Ingrid Laubrock, Myra Melford, Jason Moran, Joe Morris, Tom Rainey and Mike Reed.

As a bandleader and composer, one of Ms. Halvorson's primary outlets is her longstanding trio, featuring bassist John Hébert and drummer Ches Smith. Since their 2008 debut album, Dragon's Head, the band has been recognized as a rising star jazz band by Downbeat Magazine for five consecutive years. Ms. Halvorson's quintet, which adds trumpeter Jonathan Finlayson and alto saxophonist Jon Irabagon to the trio, has released two critically acclaimed albums on the Firehouse 12 label: Saturn Sings and Bending Bridges. Most recently she has added two additional band members-tenor saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock and trombonist Jacob Garchik-to form a septet, featured on her 2013 release Illusionary Sea. Ms. Halvorson also co-leads a longstanding chamber-jazz duo with violist Jessica Pavone, the avant-rock band People and the collective ensembles Thumbscrew and Secret Keeper."

"Pianist-composer Kris Davis has blossomed as one of the singular talents on the New York jazz scene, a deeply thoughtful, resolutely individual artist who offers "uncommon creative adventure," according to JazzTimes. The Vancouver-born, Brooklyn-residing Davis was dubbed one of the music's top up-and-comers in a 2012 New York Times article titled "New Pilots at the Keyboard," with the newspaper saying: "Over the past couple years in New York, one method for deciding where to hear jazz on a given night has been to track down the pianist Kris Davis." Reviewing one of the series of striking albums Davis has released over the past half-decade, the Chicago Sun-Times lauded the "sense of kaleidoscopic possibilities" in her playing and compositions.

Long favored by her peers and jazz fans in the know, Davis has earned high praise from no less than star pianist and MacArthur "Genius" Grant honoree Jason Moran, who included her in his Best of 2012 piece in Art Forum, writing: "A freethinking, gifted pianist on the scene, Davis lives in each note that she plays. Her range is impeccable; she tackles prepared piano, minimalism and jazz standards, all under one umbrella. I consider her an honorary descendant of Cecil Taylor and a welcome addition to the fold."

The newest album from Davis as a leader is Capricorn Climber (Clean Feed, 2013), with the pianist joined by kindred spirits Ingrid Laubrock (tenor saxophone), Mat Maneri (viola), Trevor Dunn (double-bass) and Tom Rainey (drums). Davis made her debut on record as a leader with Lifespan (Fresh Sound New Talent, 2003), followed by three progressively inventive and acclaimed albums for the Fresh Sound label: the quartet discs The Slightest Shift (2006) and Rye Eclipse (2008), then the trio set Good Citizen (2010). Davis's 2011 solo piano album on Clean Feed, Aeriol Piano, appeared on Best of the Year lists in The New York Times, JazzTimes and Art Forum. Davis wrote the extraordinary arrangements for saxophonist-composer Tony Malaby's nonet project Novela, with the album Novela released by Clean Feed in 2011 and appearing on Best of the Year lists in DownBeat and JazzTimes. The pianist is also part of the collaborative Paradoxical Frog with Laubrock and drummer Tyshawn Sorey; their eponymous 2011 album on Clean Feed was included on Best of the Year lists by National Public Radio, The New York Times and All About Jazz.

In addition to her work as a leader, Davis has performed with such top figures as Paul Motian, Bill Frisell, Tim Berne, John Hollenbeck, Michael Formanek and Mary Halvorson. Davis started playing piano at age 6, studying classical music through the Royal Conservatory in Canada and formulating her desire for a life in music by playing in the school jazz band at age 12. She earned a bachelor's degree in Jazz Piano from the University of Toronto and attended the Banff Centre for the Arts jazz program in 1997 and 2000. The pianist received a Canada Council grant to relocate to New York and study composition with Jim McNeely, then another to study extended piano techniques with Benoit Delbecq in Paris. She holds a master's in Classical Composition from the City College of New York, and she teaches at the School for Improvised Music.

The Jazz Gallery has given Davis a commissioning residency to write for her trio with Rainey and John Hébert to take place in May 2013, and the Shifting Foundation awarded her a grant to compose and record a large-ensemble project. About her art, JazzTimes has declared: "Davis draws you in so effortlessly that the brilliance of what she's doing doesn't hit you until the piece has slipped past." "

"Nate Wooley was born in 1974 in Clatskanie, Oregon, a town of 2,000 people in the timber country of the Pacific Northwestern corner of the U.S. He began playing trumpet professionally with his father, a big band saxophonist, at the age of 13. His time in Oregon, a place of relative quiet and slow time reference, instilled in Nate a musical aesthetic that has informed all of his music making for the past 20 years, but in no situation more than his solo trumpet performances.

Nate moved to New York in 2001, and has since become one of the most in-demand trumpet players in the burgeoning Brooklyn jazz, improv, noise, and new music scenes. He has performed regularly with such icons as John Zorn, Anthony Braxton, Eliane Radigue, Ken Vandermark, Fred Frith, Evan Parker, and Yoshi Wada, as well as being a collaborator with some of the brightest lights of his generation like Chris Corsano, C. Spencer Yeh, Peter Evans, and Mary Halvorson.

Wooley's solo playing has often been cited as being a part of an international revolution in improvised trumpet. Along with Peter Evans and Greg Kelley, Wooley is considered one of the leading lights of the American movement to redefine the physical boundaries of the horn, as well as demolishing the way trumpet is perceived in a historical context still overshadowed by Louis Armstrong. A combination of vocalization, extreme extended technique, noise and drone aesthetics, amplification and feedback, and compositional rigor has led one reviewer to call his solo recordings "exquisitely hostile".

In the past three years, Wooley has been gathering international acclaim for his idiosyncratic trumpet language. Time Out New York has called him "an iconoclastic trumpeter", and Downbeat's Jazz Musician of the Year, Dave Douglas has said, "Nate Wooley is one of the most interesting and unusual trumpet players living today, and that is without hyperbole". His work has been featured at the SWR JazzNow stage at Donaueschingen, the WRO Media Arts Biennial in Poland, Kongsberg, North Sea, Music Unlimited, and Copenhagen Jazz Festivals, and the New York New Darmstadt Festivals. In 2011 he was an artist in residence at Issue Project Room in Brooklyn, NY and Cafe Oto in London, England. In 2013 he performed at the Walker Art Center as a featured solo artist.

Nate is the curator of the Database of Recorded American Music (www.dramonline.org) and the editor-in-chief of their online quarterly journal Sound American (www.soundamerican.org) both of which are dedicated to broadening the definition of American music through their online presence and the physical distribution of music through Sound American Records. He also runs Pleasure of the Text which releases music by composers of experimental music at the beginnings of their careers in rough and ready mediums."

"Originally from Germany, Ingrid Laubrock resides in Brooklyn, NY. Between 1989 and 2009 she was active as a saxophonist and composer in London/UK. She performed and/or recorded with: Anthony Braxton, Dave Douglas, Kenny Wheeler, Jason Moran, Tim Berne, William Parker, Tom Rainey, Mary Halvorson, Kris Davis, Tyshawn Sorey, Craig Taborn, Luc Ex, Django Bates' Human Chain, The Continuum Ensemble and many others.

Ingrid's current projects as a leader are Anti-House, Sleepthief, Ingrid Laubrock Orchestra, Ingrid Laubrock Sextet and Ubatuba. Collaborations include LARK,Haste,Paradoxical Frog and Ingrid Laubrock/Tom Rainey Duo.She is a member of Anthony Braxton's Falling River Music Quartet, Nonet and 12+1tet, Tom Rainey Trio and Obbligato, Andrew Drury's Content Provider, Mary Halvorson Septet, Kris' Davis Quintet, Nate Wooley's Battle Pieces and Luc Ex' Assemblée. Ingrid was one of the featured soloists in Anthony Braxton's opera Trillium J.

Awards include the BBC Jazz Award for Innovation in 2004, a Fellowship in Jazz Composition by the Arts Foundation in 2006, the 2009 SWR German Radio Jazz Prize and the 2014 German Record Critics Quarterly Award. Commissions include Jammy Dodgers for jazz quintet and dancers (2006), Nonet music for Cheltenham Jazz Festival 2007, SWR New Jazz Meeting 2011 and "Vogelfrei", a piece for chamber orchestra (ACO/Tricentric Foundation). She won Rising Star/soprano saxophone in the 2015 in the 'Downbeat Annual Critics Poll and won the 'El Intruso Critics Poll for tenor saxophone in 2013. Ingrid was Improviser in Residence 2012 in the German city Moers. The post is created to introduce creative music into the city throughout the year. As part of this she led a regular improvisation ensemble and taught sound workshops in elementary schools. Other teaching experiences include improvisation workshops at Towson University, Guildhall School of Music and Drama, Baruch College, University of Michigan, University of Newcastle and many others."

"Eric Wubbels (b.1980) is a composer and pianist, and a Co-Director of the Wet Ink Ensemble.

His music has been performed throughout Europe, Asia, Australia, and the U.S., by groups such as Wet Ink Ensemble, Mivos Quartet, yarn|wire, Splinter Reeds, Kupka's Piano (AUS), SCENATET (DK), Hong Kong New Music Ensemble, and featured on festivals including Huddersfield Festival, Chicago Symphony MusicNOW, New York Philharmonic CONTACT, MATA Festival, and Zurich Tage für Neue Musik.

Wubbels has been awarded grants and fellowships from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, NYFA, NYSCA, Fromm Foundation, Chamber Music America, ISSUE Project Room, MATA Festival, Barlow Endowment, Jerome Foundation, and Yvar Mikhashoff Trust, and residencies at the MacDowell Colony ('11, '16, '20), Copland House, L'Abri (Geneva), Djerassi Resident Artists Program, and Civitella Ranieri Center (Italy).

As a performer, he has given U.S. and world premieres of works by major figures such as Peter Ablinger, Richard Barrett, Beat Furrer, George Lewis, and Mathias Spahlinger, as well as vital young artists such as Rick Burkhardt, Francesco Filidei, Erin Gee, Bryn Harrison, Clara Iannotta, Darius Jones, Cat Lamb, Ingrid Laubrock, Charmaine Lee, Alex Mincek, Sam Pluta, Katharina Rosenberger, and Kate Soper.

He has recorded for Carrier Records, hatART, Intakt, New Focus, Spektral (Vienna), quiet design, and Albany Records, among others, and has held teaching positions at Amherst College and Oberlin Conservatory."

"Taylor Ho Bynum (b. 1975) has spent his career navigating the intersections between structure and improvisation - through musical composition, performance and interdisciplinary collaboration, and through production, organizing, teaching, writing and advocacy. As heard on over twenty recordings as a bandleader, Bynum's expressionistic playing on cornet and his expansive vision as composer have garnered him critical attention as one of the singular musical voices of his generation. He currently leads his Sextet and 7-tette, and works with many collective ensembles including a duo with drummer Tomas Fujiwara, the improv trio Book of Three, the UK/US collaborative Convergence Quartet, the dance/music interdisciplinary ensemble Masters of Ceremony, and the trans-idiomatic little big band Positive Catastrophe.

His varied endeavors include his Acoustic Bicycle Tours (where he travels to concerts solely by bike across thousands of miles) and his stewardship of Anthony Braxton's Tri-Centric Foundation (which he serves as executive director, producing most of Braxton's recent major projects). In addition to his own bands, his ongoing collaboration with Braxton, past work with other legendary figures such as Bill Dixon and Cecil Taylor, and current collective projects with forward thinking peers, Bynum increasingly travels the globe to conduct community-based large ensembles in explorations of new creative orchestra music. He is also a published author and contributor to The New Yorker's Culture Blog, has taught at universities, festivals, and workshops worldwide, and has served as a panelist and consultant for leading funders and organizations. His work has received support from Creative Capital, the Connecticut Office of the Arts, Chamber Music America, New Music USA, USArtists International, and the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation."

"Greg Chudzik is an active performer across numerous genres on the double bass and electric bass. Currently, he can be seen performing regularly with several new music groups, including Signal Ensemble, Wet Ink Ensemble, and Talea Ensemble. Greg is also a member of several bands, including Empyrean Atlas, Bing and Ruth, and The Briars of North America. He has worked with numerous influential figures in contemporary music, including Steve Coleman, Steve Reich, Pierre Boulez, George Benjamin, Helmut Lachenmann, Charles Wuorinen, Alex Mincek and Tristan Perich. Last January, Greg completed a tour opening for Jeff Mangum, formerly of Neutral Milk Hotel. Greg's recording credits include playing on the Grammy-nominated "Barcelonaza" by Jorge Leiderman, "Synovial Joints" by Steve Coleman on Pi Recordings, "Tomorrow Was the Golden Age" by Bing and Ruth on RVNG records, the album "Americans" by Scott Johnson (Tzadik records), multiple recordings with Signal Ensemble on New Amsterdam and Mode Records, the album "Grown Unknown" by Lia Ices (Secretly Canadian records), the album "Inner Circle" by Empyrean Atlas, and the album "High Violet" by The National on 4AD records. Greg's new album "Solo Works, Vol. 1" features original pieces of music written for bass guitar and electronics, and will be released this July on Panoramic Records."

"Pat Swoboda is a NYC-based bass player dedicated to performing the works of living composers, and has worked closely with Michael Gordon, Du Yun, David Lang, and Scott Wollschleger. Recent highlights include performing and recording David Lang's powerful and introspective opera The Loser with Bang on a Can and LA Opera, premiering and touring Michael Gordon's Mixed Tulips with Bearthoven, and appearing on NPR Music's Tiny Desk concert series with LADAMA. Pat is a member of contemporary chamber orchestras Contemporaneous and Hotel Elefant. Also an accomplished orchestral musician, Pat has performed with the American Symphony, American Composers Orchestra, Albany Symphony, Riverside Symphony, and New York Pops Orchestra. On Broadway, Pat has performed in the pits for Les Miserable, Paramour, The Nance, and A Christmas Story."

"A versatile cellist and champion of current music, Maria Hadge has been described as a "stunning" and "brilliant" musician, performing with a natural spunk. Her playing has taken her around the globe, working with early-career and master composers. A resident of New York City, Hadge is an active freelance musician who feels equally at home with contemporary music, free improvisation, and musical theater. Recent credits include Beauty and the Beast, Sound of Music, Into the Woods, Bright Star, and Fiddler on the Roof in Yiddish at Stage 42.

Miss Hadge performs as a core member of Ensemble Mise-En, which regularly promotes works by emerging composers, participates in residencies and festivals around the world, and collaborates with established composers. As a member of Luminous Sounds, she plays pop arrangements and classical tunes for private events and weddings in New York City and Long Island. In early 2022, Hadge joined forces with flutist Kelley Barnett to create Spira Duo, which commissions and develops music for contrabass flute and cello."

"Hailed as "Chicago's first lady of the cello" by Timeout Chicago Magazine, Dutch cellist Katinka Kleijn defies today's traditional definition of a cellist, transitioning comfortably through the styles of classical, experimental, contemporary, improvisatory, folk and progressive rock, as well as across the traditional fields of solo, chamber and orchestral performance.

Most recently, she appeared as soloist in the World Premiere of Dai Fujikura's cello concerto at Lincoln Center, New York, where The New York Times described her as "a player of formidable expressive gifts".

A member of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Kleijn is in frequent demand as soloist, performing with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Charles Dutoit in Penderecki's Triple Cello Concerto, as well as with the The Hague Philharmonic, the Chicago Sinfonietta , the Illinois Philharmonic, the Symphony Orchestras of Elmhurst, DuPage and Sheboygan, and as a soloist in Mark-Anthony Turnage's Kai on the CSO's MusicNOW Series.

Known for her innovative individual projects, Kleijn presented multi-media solo shows at the Library of Congress, Washington DC, the Chicago Humanities Festival and the Chicago Cultural Center. A collaboration with the Chicago-based performance art duo Industry of the Ordinary resulted in the highly-acclaimed and publicized work "Intelligence in the Human-Machine" by Daniel Dehaan, which Time Magazine called "a balancing act for Kleijn's whole body," and where Kleijn performs a duet with her own brainwaves.

In Kleijn's extensive work as a member of the prolific International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE), named Ensemble of the Year 2014 by Musical America, she has given numerous premieres, including the US premiere of Zona for solo cello and ensemble by Magnus Lindberg at the Lincoln Center's Mostly Mozart Festival, and Eternal Escape for solo cello by Dai Fujikura, described by the Chicago Tribune's John von Rhein as "a five-minute tour de force, played with wonderfully incisive bravado."

An avid chamber musician, Kleijn has collaborated with Yo-Yo Ma, Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Christoph Eschenbach, Richard Goode, and Lynn Harrell; and appeared in the Symphony Center Presents Chamber Music Series with pianist Jeremy Denk and violinist Stefan Jackiw. She has performed at the Marlboro Music Festival and Ravinia Festival's Rising Star Series. Kleijn was a member of the Chicago Chamber Musicians from 2006-2010.

Kleijn recorded for the Naxos, Boston Record and Cedille labels. Her 2003 recording of David Baker's Cello Concerto with the Chicago Sinfonietta received rave reviews: The Strad Magazine wrote "Kleijn gives infectious energy to the performance" and Fanfare Magazine commented that "Kleijn brings plenty of temperament and gorgeous tone."

Non-classical recordings include CD's with the progrock metal band District 97, the ambient-folk duo Relax Your Ears, singer-song writer David Sylvian, and for the newest single "Valkyrie" by Asia with John Wetton. She is part of a working improvised music duo with Chicago-based guitarist Bill MacKay, and performs on the Chicago free jazz scene."

"Joshua Nathan Rubin is a founding clarinetist, board member, and served as the co-Artistic Director of the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICEensemble) from 2014-2018, where he oversaw the creative direction of more than one hundred concerts per season in the United States and abroad. As a clarinetist, the New York Times has praised him as, "incapable of playing an inexpressive note."

Joshua has worked closely with many of the prominent composers of our time, including George Crumb, Matana Roberts, Alvin Lucier, David Lang, Chaya Czernowin, Du Yun, Christian Wolff, George Lewis, Steven Schick, Kaija Saariaho, Craig Taborn, Pauline Oliveros, Okkyung Lee, Nathan Davis, Tyshawn Sorey, John Zorn, and Mario Davidovsky. His interest in electronic music throughout his career has led him work on making these technologies easier to use for both composers and performers. Joshua can be heard on recordings from the Nonesuch, Kairos, New Focus, Mode, Cedille, Naxos, Bridge, New Amsterdam, and Tzadik labels. His album There Never is No Light, available on the Tundra label, highlights music that uses technology to capture the human engagement of the performer and the listener.

[...]

His clarinet studies were mentored by Lawrence McDonald, Mark Nuccio, and Steven Cohen. He served on the faculty of the Banff Music Centre's Ensemble Evolution summer program from 2016-2019. Rubin is on the faculty of soundSCAPE Festival and Ensemble Evolution. He is also on the faculty of the College of the Performing Arts at The New School.

Joshua holds degrees in Biology and Clarinet from Oberlin College and Conservatory, and a Master's degree from the Mannes School of Music.

His passion for technology in arts led Joshua to develop LUIGI, management software that is available to ensembles and other arts organizations who value transparency and collective management, as well as his ongoing work to make electronic music technologies easier to use for performers and composers. He maintains an artistic presence in New York and Los Angeles."

"Katie Schoepflin is a clarinetist, vocalist, pianist and composer who lives in Chicago and works as a freelance musician. As a member of Ensemble Dal Niente, she has had the privilege of working with and performing the works of Hans Abrahamsen, Louis Andriessen, Raphael Cendo, Brian Ferneyhough, Lee Hyla, George Lewis, Enno Poppe and Augusta Reed Thomas. Katie has recently had the extraordinary privilege of performing Enno Poppe's clarinet concerto, Holz. She also performed with Dal Niente at the 2014 International Summer Courses for New Music in Darmstadt, Germany. Katie earned her Bachelor of Music degree from Indiana University where she won the IU clarinet concerto competition and was awarded a Performer's Certificate. As a participant of the 2006 Henry Mancini Institute in Los Angeles, Katie worked with many renowned artists including Tony Bennett and Jon Williams. In 2008, Katie spent a year abroad in Japan where she was principal clarinetist of the Kakogawa Philharmonic Orchestra in Hyogo prefecture. She also sang jazz sets regularly in Kobe. She earned her Master of Music degree in 2011 from McGill University where she was awarded a full Schulich School of Music scholarship. While studying at McGill, Katie was a participant in the 2011 National Youth Orchestra of Canada, touring and performing extensively throughout Canada. Her primary instructors have been John Bruce Yeh, Alain Desgagne, James Campbell, Frank Kowalsky and Mary Kantor. When she is not making music, Katie is designing and creating jewelry for her etsy.com shop."

"Improviser, composer, and interpreter Tim Feeney seeks to explore and examine the possibilities inherent in unstable sound and duration. Tim began working in this thread in 2002, within Boston's community of improvisers interested in austere combinations of sounds and silences, and has since performed and recorded with musicians throughout the United States and abroad. He frequently collaborates with artists including the trio Meridian, with percussionists Sarah Hennies and Greg Stuart, pianist Annie Lewandowski, cellist and electronic musician Vic Rawlings, vocalist Ken Ueno, saxophonist Andrew Raffo Dewar, banjo and electronic musician Holland Hopson, trumpeter Nate Wooley, sound artists Jed Speare and Ernst Karel, video artist Jane Cassidy, and many others.

He has presented work at experimental spaces throughout the United States, such as the Red Room in Baltimore, Boston's Institute of Contemporary Art, the Knitting Factory New York, and The Stone, as well as the Center for New Music and Audio Technology at UC-Berkeley, the Stanford Art Museum, Princeton University, and Dartmouth College. Within this community, he has recorded for the experimental Caduc, Accidie, Rhizome.s, Full Spectrum, Sedimental, homophoni, Audiobot, Soul on Rice, lildiscs, and Brassland/Talitres labels.

Tim also builds sound installations, concerned primarily with the acoustic properties and geographies of neglected or nontraditional spaces. His recent work has been presented by festivals at locations including Silo City, the abandoned grain complex along the Buffalo River in western New York, Boston's Metropolitan Waterworks Museum, the preserved steam pumping station that processed the city's drinking water, and the Bernheim Research Forest, outside Louisville, Kentucky, as well as by more formal events at the Contemporary Art Center New Orleans and the University of Richmond.

As an interpreter of contemporary compositions, Tim has performed at venues such as the Brooklyn Academy of Music, Zankel Hall, the American Academy in Rome, and the Norfolk Chamber Music Festival, and his work has been featured on WNYC Radio's New Sounds. A member of Boston's Callithumpian Consort, Tim appeared on the Musica Nova series at the Gewandhaus in Leipzig, Germany, and at New York's Tonic, as part of its 50th birthday celebration for John Zorn. As a founding member of So Percussion, Tim appeared in concerts and masterclasses at Columbia University and Williams College, and commissioned David Lang's The So-Called Laws of Nature, premiered at the 2001 Bang on a Can Marathon.

He was a co-founder of the duo Non Zero, with saxophonist Brian Sacawa, which performed American and world premieres of works in concerts at MIT, NYU, the University of Michigan, the Kerrytown Concert Hall, New York's Tenri Cultural Institute, and Eastern Nazarene College. As the percussionist in the onstage band for Rinde Eckert's chamber opera Orpheus X, Tim performed to great acclaim in stagings at Boston's American Repertory Theater, the 2008 Hong Kong International Festival for the Arts, and New York's Duke Theater at 42nd Street, praised by the New York Times.

Tim is currently Percussion Artist at the California Institute of the Arts, and is also a faculty member of the Chosen Vale International Percussion Seminar, a yearly chamber music-intensive workshop bringing students from the US and abroad to rehearse and perform at the Enfield Shaker Museum in New Hampshire. From 2012 to 2018 Tim served as Assistant Professor of Percussion at the University of Alabama, where he led the applied percussion studio and the Alabama Percussion Ensemble, served as the principal percussionist of the Tuscaloosa Symphony Orchestra, and was a frequent performer with the Alabama Symphony Orchestra. From 2007 to 2012 Tim directed the percussion program at Cornell University, where he taught the Cornell Percussion Ensemble, Cornell Steel Band, and CU World Drum and Dance Ensemble.

An active guest educator, Tim has given workshops on improvisation, chamber music and solo percussion performance, Ewe dance-drumming, and Balinese gamelan at schools including the Eastman School of Music, Oberlin Conservatory, the University of Tennessee, the University of Washington, Michigan State University, the University of Miami, the Longy School of Music, UC-Berkeley, UC-Davis, Bucknell University, and the Peabody Conservatory. He has presented new music and given invited lectures and workshops at the international conventions of the Percussive Arts Society in 2013, 2014, 2015, and 2017, and is a member of the PAS New Music Research Committee.

Tim earned a Bachelor of Music degree from the Cleveland Institute of Music, and Master of Music and Doctor of Musical Arts degrees from the Yale School of Music, where his teachers included Robert van Sice, Richard Weiner, and Paul Yancich. In addition, he has studied Balinese gamelan with Andrew McGraw of the University of Richmond, and the late Pak Wayan Konolan in Den Pasar, Bali, and Ewe dance-drumming with James Burns of Binghamton University, Johnson Kemeh of the University of Ghana at Legon, and with master drummer Kodzo Tagborlo of the Dzigbordi dance-drumming society, Dzodze, Volta Region, Ghana."

"Jacob Garchik, multi-instrumentalist, composer, and arranger, was born in San Francisco and has lived in New York since 1994. At home in a wide variety of styles and musical roles, he has become a vital part of NYC's downtown and Brooklyn scene, playing trombone with the Lee Konitz Nonet, Ohad Talmor/Steve Swallow Sextet, The Four Bags, Slavic Soul Party, and the John Hollenbeck Large Ensemble. In 2012 he released the acclaimed solo CD "The Heavens: the Atheist Gospel Trombone Album".

Since 2006 Jacob has contributed dozens of arrangements and transcriptions for the Kronos Quartet of music from all over the world. His arrangements were featured on "Floodplain" (2009) and "Rainbow" (2010). He composed the score for Kronos for the documentary film "The Campaign" (2013) about the fight for marriage equality in California, which aired on PBS and at the frameline37 film festival in San Francisco.Complete list of arrangements for Kronos

As a trombonist Jacob has worked with many of the luminaries of the avant-garde, including Henry Threadgill, Laurie Anderson, Anthony Braxton, Anthony Coleman, Joe Maneri, Frank London, James Tenney, Josh Roseman, Don Byron, Terry Reilly, George Lewis, and Billy Martin. He has also played in ensembles led by rising artists such as Mary Halvorson, Dan Weiss, Miguel Zenon, and Steve Lehman. In 2013 he was named a "Rising Star" in the Downbeat Magazine Jazz Critic's Poll. Jacob also plays accordion, bass trombone, tuba, computer, and piano."

"Dan is a tubist currently living and working in New York City. Since his move there in 2005, he has been active as a soloist, improviser, and sideman in a wide variety of settings. Dan's current interests are in experimental music and improvisation, and he has performed at many of New York City's most respected venues for creative music including The Stone, Roulette, and Issue Project Room. Dan has collaborated with many New York artists, including Tony Malaby, Nate Wooley, Michael Attias, Ben Gerstein, Tom Rainey, Peter Evans, Kris Davis, Ingrid Laubrock, and Matthew Welch. Recent projects include recordings with Tony Malaby's Novela (Clean Feed), Harris Eisenstadt's Canada Day Octet (482 Music), and Jeff Newell's New Trad Band. Dan will also be on a forthcoming Anthony Braxton release, featuring music from the Falling River Series in small ensembles from Wesleyan University.

Dan currently leads a trio comprised of himself, Tom Blancarte (bass) and Brian Osborne (percussion). The group plays a mix of freely improvised music and his compositions, some of which are influenced by music of the Doom Metal genre. Their debut LP, "Acid Soil", is out on the Heat Retention Records label. In March of 2011, the Trio completed a 9 day tour of the midwest/east coast.

Equally at home in more traditional jazz settings, Dan plays in the old-timey jazz band Grandpa Musselman and His Syncopators. The Syncopators appear frequently at high society events in and around New York City, and in 2007 took part in the Jazz at Aspen Festival, directed by bassist Christian McBride.

Dan also plays a lot of contemporary music. He has premiered solo tuba works at St. Bartholomew's Church, Merkin Hall, and The Stone. In 2009, Dan was featured as part of Kagel Nacht, a celebration of the music of composer Mauricio Kagel, in which he performed two of Kagel's solo works, Atem and Mirum. As an orchestral performer, Dan has played under great conductors such as James Levine and Herbert Blomstedt, and has worked personally with composers such as Helmut Lachenmann and Alvin Lucier. Dan is a member of the International Contemporary Ensemble, and has also worked with the American Composers Orchestra, Signal Ensemble, New York City Ballet, New World Symphony, and the Tanglewood Festival Orchestra. Dan recently recorded a DVD of Iannis Xenakis' chamber music for Mode Records, with the International Contemporary Ensemble and percussionist Steven Schick conducting.

Currently, Dan plays on the Broadway musical Chicago, and is adjunct-faculty at New Jersey City University."

"A native of St. Paul, Minnesota, violist Miranda Sielaff pursues a rich and varied musical career in New York City. She regularly performs and tours with several ensembles, including The Knights, the Caravel Trio, String Orchestra of New York City, and the composers' collective Wet Ink. She performed at Carnegie Hall's Making Music series with Pierre Boulez and the Lucerne Festival Academy. She has also played with Yo-Yo Ma and the Silk Road Ensemble, and appeared with The Knights and Itzhak Perlman at the 2012 Ravinia Festival. She can be heard with The Knights' albums on the labels SONY Classical and Ancalagon Records."

"Violist Hannah Levinson is an in-demand performer of contemporary and classical music based in New York City. She has recently been featured as a soloist and chamber musician at Carnegie Hall, The Stone, 92Y, Miller Theater, Willamette Valley Chamber Music Festival, June in Buffalo, and the Andy Warhol Museum, and at international festivals including the Kroch Festival (Stockholm), Musikprotokol Festival (Graz), Projektgruppe Neue Musik (Bremen), and Festival Musica (Strasbourg). Dedicated to working with living composers, Hannah has commissioned and premiered over 40 chamber and solo works and is currently editing the solo viola works of Lucia Ronchetti.

Hannah is a founding member and Executive Director of the violin/viola duo andPlay, described by I Care If You Listen as "enthusiastic champions for new music and collaboration." andPlay's debut album, playlist (New Focus Recordings) was recorded as part of a residency at Renssaelaer Polytechnical Institute's Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center (EMPAC) and was included on "The Best of Bandcamp Contemporary Classical: October 2019" list.

Committed to both contemporary and classical repertoire, Hannah is also a member of the Talea Ensemble ("a crucial part of the New York cultural ecosphere" New York Times), Fair Trade Trio, and the Albany Symphony Orchestra, and a former member of the Pittsburgh Opera Orchestra. She frequently performs with NYC ensembles including the International Contemporary Ensemble, either/or, counter)induction, Heartbeat Opera, Cantata Profana, Contemporaneous, and The Rhythm Method Quartet.

A strong believer in sharing her artistic practice with her local community, Hannah is committed to audience engagement events through "andPlay (in) conversation," a free series in Upper Manhattan that provides opportunities for audiences to look inside the collaborative process of creating music, and through performances with organizations including "Music for Autism."

Hannah is currently Music Artist Faculty at NYU Steinhardt and at the Manhattan School of Music Precollege. She earned her degrees at Oberlin College and Conservatory (BM in Viola Performance, BA in Russian East European Studies), Manhattan School of Music (MM in Contemporary Performance), and NYU Steinhardt (PhD in Performance). Her primary teachers include Karen Ritscher, Martha Strongin Katz, and Nadia Sirota. Her research explores how interactions between composers and political structures affect the creation of new music."

"Sam Bardfeld is a violinist, composer, arranger and author. He is a member of The Jazz Passengers and a frequent collaborator of Bruce Springsteen's. He has worked as sideman with a long list of jazz, pop, folk and experimental acts including Elvis Costello, John Zorn, Calexico, Anthony Braxton, Henry Butler, Debbie Harry, Steven Bernstein, John Cale, Kris Davis, Savion Glover, The Red Clay Ramblers, Nancy Sinatra, Willie Colon, The String Trio of NY, Hank Roberts, Johnny Pacheco, Dar Williams, and Chuck Prophet among others.

Bardfeld's latest recording with pianist Kris Davis and drummer Michael Sarin, The Great Enthusiasms (BJUR, 2017), earned acclaim from top critics including Nate Chinen who called it "brilliantly odd and altogether lovely" (WBGO, 2017); Bill Milkowski, who said "[Sam's playing] combines a touch of Stuff Smith's playfulness with a Charles Ives aesthetic - Four Stars!" (Downbeat, 2017); and LucidCulture "this is the great violin recording Monk never made, one of the 10 best jazz records of the year." His earlier recordings, Taxidermy (CIMP, 1999) and Periodic Trespasses (FreshSounds, 2006) also earned acclaim, including a "4-Star" rating in Downbeat magazine, raves in Jazz Times, Jazziz magazine and "4-Stars" in All Music Guide (both recordings). He has performed with his own group at jazz festivals and clubs throughout Europe including Banlieues Bleues (Paris), Sud-Tirol (Italy) and Porgy and Bess (Vienna). In 2019, Bardfeld was voted #5 in the El Intruso International Jazz Critics Poll in the Violin/Viola category.

In addition to being a member of the Jazz Passengers, Sam's jazz playing is featured as a member of Roy Nathanson's Sotto Voce and Joel Harrison's String Choir and he has toured and/or recorded with Michael Attias' Sextet, Royal Hartigan's Blood Drum Spirit, Butler/Bernstein and the Hot 9, Steven Bernstein's MTO, Anthony Braxton's Trillium Orchestra, Ingrid Laubrock's Orchestra, Vince Giordano's Nighthawks and many other groups.

Sam's arranging credits include work for Calexico, Nancy Sinatra, film music for Hedwig and the Angry Inch composer Stephen Trask, and work on the Broadway-bound production of Lone Star Love with The Red Clay Ramblers. He has also served as string contractor for Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band (2009 MSG and 2016 US tour), Gilberto Santa Rosa (Carnegie Hall) and Chuck Prophet (2014 US tour).

In the 1990's, Sam's immersion in NYC's fertile Salsa and Latin Jazz scene led to writing a book, Latin Violin (Hal Leonard, 2002), considered to be the authoritative work on the Afro-Cuban violin tradition. He is also an instructor of jazz violin at the New School jazz program in NYC.

Sam studied violin technique with Gerald Beal and Joey Corpus, improvisation with Bill Barron, George Garzone and Richie Beirach and counterpoint with Paul Caputo. He graduated from Wesleyan University in 1990 where he studied music, anthropology and history. In 1991 he received a year-long Ford Foundation grant to study ethnomusicology at Wesleyan."

"Maya Bennardo (she/her) is an active performer, improviser, and composer living between Brooklyn, NY and Stockholm, Sweden. Maya is interested in opening the dialogue and blurring the boundaries between composers and performers, and is devoted to performing music of the present. She is a founding member of the violin/viola duo andPlay, described by I Care If You Listen as "enthusiastic champions for new music and collaboration." She is a core member of Mivos Quartet and also performs new and traditional repertoire for violin and piano with pianist Karl Larson.

Maya also performs regularly with Nouveau Classical Project and Hotel Elefant, and has worked with ensemble mise-en, Contemporaneous, Mimesis Ensemble, Ensemble Signal, [Switch~ Ensemble], and Talea Ensemble.

Recent highlights include recording residencies at Electronic Media and Performing Arts Center (EMPAC) in Troy, NY and at the Elektronmusikstudion (EMS) in Stockholm, Sweden with andPlay, performances at the Library of Congress on the "Betts" Stradivarius violin (Washington D.C.), Walt Disney Hall on Noon to Midnight (Los Angeles, CA), Lucerne Festival Academy with Saul Williams (Lucerne, CH), North Sea Jazz Festival with Ambrose Akinmusire (Rotterdam, NE), June in Buffalo (Buffalo, NY), Lincoln Center Festival (NYC), and Strings of Autumn (Prague, CZ). Maya was a fellow at the Bang on a Can Summer Festival at Mass MoCa 2014/15, a member of the Lucerne Festival Academy Orchestra in 2014, and a participant in the Darmstadt Internationale Ferienkurse für Neue Musik 2016.

Maya recently recorded her first solo record, 'four strings' with music by Eva-Maria Houben and Kristofer Svensson which will be released on the kuyin label, September 17th 2022. The album is a continuation of Bennardo's work exploring sonic fragility and temporal stasis on the violin.

Maya enjoys a rich teaching life, and teaches students in her private studio. She graduated from NYU with a Master of Music and the Oberlin Conservatory of Music with a Bachelor of Music studying with Gregory Fulkerson at both institutions."

"Jean Cook, violinist and Treasurer

Jean Cook has been playing violin since 1979. She is part of the 11tet, a New York based jazz composers workshop, and is a founding member of the PnR Salon in Washington, DC, which brings together post-punk rockers and classically trained musicians. In 2000, she appeared at the Kennedy Center's Hip-Hop Festival and the Smithsonian Folklife Festival with the Hip-Hop Philharmonic, a DC based live hip hop orchestra. Occasionally she plays around New York with the Dixieland group "Wriggle's Red-Hot Agate-Cracking Jassers". She currently records and performs with Beauty Pill, Gena Rowlands Band, Ida, Jenny Toomey, and Jon Langford/Ship and Pilot.

Jean produced and hosted "The Twentieth Century String Quartet" on WKCR-FM, New York from 1995-1996. She was the publicist for Washington Performing Arts Society for three years before moving to New York in 2000. Recently, she curated a western classical recital series for WPAS and produced the multimedia DIY opera, The Nitrate Hymnal. She currently works for a political group called Air Traffic Control that helps musicians to be more effective in the current election cycle."

"A proponent of new music, Erica Dicker is committed to creative collaboration with living composers and innovation in both the classical concert hall and nontraditional contexts. Erica is a founding member of the contemporary chamber music collective Till By Turning, an ensemble devoted to reinforcing the modern canon and linking educational programs to their repertoire. As part of the New York-based horn trio, Kylwyria, Erica and her colleagues, Julia Den Boer (piano) and John Gattis (horn), work to generate interest in and develop adventurous chamber music repertoire for their unique instrumentation through dynamic programming and commissioning. Erica is also violinist in Katherine Young's Pretty Monsters, as well as Vaster Than Empires, an electro-acoustic collaboration with composer and sound artist Paul Schuette and percussionist Allen Otte. She has premiered works by many composers including solo works written for her by Olivia Block, Turkar Gasimzada, Ryan Ingebritsen and Katherine Young. Erica also writes and performs her own music, exploring the idiomatic modalities and textures of her instrument. Taking Auspices, her debut solo album, is released by Tubapede Records as a digital download and limited edition vinyl LP.

Erica serves as concertmaster of Anthony Braxton's Tri-Centric Foundation Orchestra, an ensemble founded to document and disseminate the operas by composer and multi-reedist Anthony Braxton, and has also performed with Braxton's Falling River Quartet and Diamond Curtain Wall Quartet at festivals in Belgium, Germany, Italy, Macedonia, Poland, and Turkey and appeared with the 12 + 1-tet at the 2012 Venice Biennale. Erica also writes about and curates performances of Braxton's work, most recently for the International Contemporary Ensemble at the 2017 Ojai Music Festival.

A passionate advocate for preserving the vitality of orchestral performance, Erica also lends her talent to orchestras across the Midwestern United States, such as the Grand Rapids Symphony. She previously served as associate concertmaster of the Peoria Symphony and associate principal second violin of the South Bend Symphony, and held leadership roles in festivals including Spoleto USA and the National Repertory Orchertra. In Germany Erica was part of the Bergische Symphoniker and performed with the Bachakademie Stuttgart International Festival Orchestra under the direction of Helmut Rilling.

Erica received her training at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music (BM), the University of Minnesota (MM), and the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music (DMA). Her primary teachers include Gabriel Pegis, Marilyn McDonald, and Jorja Fleezanis.

Erica resides in Astoria, New York with her husband and creative collaborator, tubist Dan Peck."

"Mark Feldman (born 1955 in Chicago) is an American jazz violinist. Feldman worked in Chicago from 1973-1980, in Nashville, Tennessee from 1980-1986, in New York City and Western Europe from 1986. He has performed with John Zorn, John Abercrombie, The Masada String Trio, Dave Douglas, Uri Caine, and Billy Hart.

He was a member of the Civic Orchestra of Chicago and played in many bar bands in Chicago. He played on over 200 recordings in Nashville as a studio musician, was a member of the Nashville Symphony, and was a member of the touring groups of country western entertainers Loretta Lynn and Ray Price.

In 2003 he was soloist with Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra in Guus Janssen's Violin Concerto and with the WDR Jazz Orchestra in Concerto for Violin and Jazz Orchestra by Bill Dobbins. At Newf York's Lincoln Center he performed in duo with pianists Paul Bley and Muhal Richard Abrams.

He has recorded with Michael Brecker, Lee Konitz, Joe Lovano, and Chris Potter and has played on over 100 recordings in New York City as a soloist in contemporary music and modern jazz.

Feldman has released several albums, including Music for Violin Alone (Tzadik, 1995); Book of Tells (Enja, 2000); What Exit (ECM, 2006 with British pianist John Taylor; To Fly to Steal (Intakt, 2010) with bassist Thomas Morgan and drummer Gerry Hemingway; and Oblivia (Tzadik, 2010) with his wife, Swiss pianist Sylvie Courvoisier. In September 2012, he and violinist Jean-Luc Ponty produced the debut album of Scott Tixier. Feldman wrote the liner notes."

"Violin/Vox/Freestyle Composition artist Mazz Swift is critically acclaimed as one of America's most talented and versatile performers today and engages audiences worldwide with her signature weaving of composition and improvisation called MazzMuse. Aside from her work as a performing artist, Ms. Swift is a composer. Her works include commissions by The University of Delaware, Neues Kabarett (through a Meet-the-Composer grant), The New Harmony Music School & Festival, and the Blaffer Foundation. Several of her pieces for atypical chamber ensemble have been performed live and also replayed on National Public Radio. Mazz is also a teaching artist with Carnegie Hall's Musical connections program, conducts workshops on free improvisation in the States and abroad, and has traveled to Suriname, Mozambique, C™te d'Ivoire, Ghana, Cameroon, Senegal, Albania and Siberia as cultural ambassador on behalf of the United States Department of State."

"Amirtha Kidambi "takes a holistic approach to singing, which can mean treating every element as unfixed: Words can be opened up, rendered nonspecific. Melody can be repeated and frozen and stuck in place. Markings of rhythm can become utterly abstract, freed from cadence." (New York Times). Kidambi is the bandleader of Elder Ones and a soloist and collaborator in groups including Mary Halvorson's newest quintet Code Girl, Charlie Looker's early music inspired dark folk band Seaven Teares, Darius Jones' vocal quartet Elizabeth-Caroline Unit and Samesoul Maker and Pat Spadine's analog percussion and light ensemble Ashcan Orchestra. As Ben Ratliff wrote in the New York Times, "the aggressive and sublime first album by the band Elder Ones, Holy Science, is a kind of gauge for how strong and flexible the scene of young musicians in New York's improvised and experimental music world can be. At the center of it are drones and phonemes. The group's leader, the composer and singer Amirtha Kidambi, holds forth behind a harmonium, the small keyboard instrument with hand-pumped bellows; it's commonly used in bhajan, the Indian devotional-singing tradition that was central to her musical experience while growing up in a South Indian family." Kidambi formally trained in classical music, singing works by experimental composers including Robert Ashley and Luigi Nono, but the pull of free jazz and Alice Coltrane drew her toward a different path. The influence of both Alice and John Coltrane is especially apparent on the , as is her work with composer and saxophonist Darius Jones, and her study of Carnatic music. Kidambi formally trained in classical music, singing works by avant-gardists including Nono and Stockhausen, but the pull of free jazz and Alice Coltrane drew her toward a different path. The influence of both Alice and John Coltrane is especially apparent on the new album, as is her work with composer and saxophonist Darius Jones, and her study of Carnatic music. Elder Ones performed extensively nationally and internationally, on tours and at festivals such as NYC Winter Jazzfest, Berliner Festspiele in Germany and Festiwal Jazz Jantar in Poland, among other.

Kidambi is invested in the performance creative music, from free improvisation and jazz, to experimental bands, and new music. As an improviser, she has played with Matana Roberts, Tyshawn Sorey, Daniel Carter, Ava Mendoza, Sam Newsome, Peter Evans, Trevor Dunn, and many innovators in the New York scene. A life changing decision to create her own artistic work came from a collaboration with the late AACM founder, composer-pianist Muhal Richard Abrams', performing his Dialogue Social. Kidambi has also premiered Darius Jones' The Oversoul Manual at Carnegie Hall, Samesoul Maker at Roulette, LawNOrder at Winter Jazzfest, a premiere of electronic composer Ben Vida's work Slipping Control for voice and electronics with Tyondai Braxton at the Borderline Festival in Athens, Greece, the premiere of the late Robert Ashley's final opera CRASH at the Whitney Biennial, a Jazz Gallery commission for Mary Halvorson's Code Girl, the premiere of William Parker's Soul of Light and forthcoming recording project Voices Fall From the Sky and a commission from the Jerome Foundation for her quartet Elder Ones at Roulette and artist residency at EMPAC to record the group's debut album.

Amirtha earned a B.F.A. in Voice from Loyola Marymount University and an M.M. in Voice and Musicology from CUNY Brooklyn College, where she served as adjunct faculty. She is currently pursuing a PhD in Ethnomusicology at Columbia University."

"A former journalist (Fuji Television Network Japan) with childhood piano training at Juilliard Pre-College and a stint as a Gulf War reporter on her résumé ('90-'91 working in Iraq, Kuwait, Jordan and Saudi Arabia), Kyoko Kitamura is an oddball vocalist, composer and bandleader who has worked with many distinguished musicians including Anthony Braxton, Taylor Ho Bynum, Steve Coleman, William Parker and Reggie Workman.

She is a featured vocalist on Anthony Braxton's opera Trillium J (New Braxton House 2015), 12 Duets (DCWM) 2012 (NBH 2014), Trillium E (NBH 2011, the first-ever studio-recording of an Anthony Braxton opera), and the Syntactical GTM Choir (NYC) 2011 (NBH 2012). Also known for her interdisciplinary projects, she released her first solo album Armadillo In Sunset Park in 2012, a collection of songs written for and choreographed by Mark Lamb Dance. She can also be heard on the critically acclaimed Taylor Ho Bynum & SpiderMonkey Strings release Madeleine Dreams (Firehouse 12 Records 2009), Jamie Baum's Solace (Sunnyside Records 2008), and Steve Coleman's Lucidarium (Label Bleu 2004) among others.

She currently works with Anthony Braxton as a vocalist in his Tri-Centric Orchestra and as the Director of Communications for his Tri-Centric Foundation. She studies counterpoint and Schoenberg harmony with Paul Caputo.

As for her own current projects, she leads Tidepool Fauna (Ingrid Laubrock on sax, Ken Filiano on bass) and co-leads Armadillo In Sunset Park (collaborative project with dancers of Mark Lamb Dance).

Kitamura has garnered critical praise for her "great vocal range, veering from wordless vocalese to near operatic feats" (AllAboutJazz) and All Music Guide describes her as "an expressive vocalist who knows how to be quirky and eccentric but is also quite musical." Most recently, in a performance with the Anthony Braxton Trio at the Angel City Jazz Festival in L.A. (Anthony Braxton, Taylor Ho Bynum, Kyoko Kitamura), Robert Bush of AllAboutJazz wrote, "Enough cannot be said about the stunning abilities of Ms. Kitamura-she functions at the highest instrumental level and was able to deal with pages of dense notation, acrobatic intervals and intricate layering with devastating surety." "

"Josh Sinton, a native of Southern New Jersey, born in 1971, is a creative musician who specializes in playing the baritone saxophone and bass clarinet. Growing up, his musical inspirations were his father's record collection, his brothers' record collections and watching his father play stride piano at parties. There wasn't anyone else playing music so to this day Sinton remains mystified that the music bug stuck at all.

He studied composition at the University of Chicago and improvisation at the AACM in the 1990's and then proceeded to carve out a niche for himself in Chicago writing and performing music for dance (with Julia Mayer) and theater (at Steppenwolf Studio and Bailiwick Repertory) as well as performing and studying with local musicians such as Fred Anderson, Ken Vandermark, Ari Brown and Cameron Pfiffner. He would leave Chicago during this time for extended backpacking trips around Europe and India and found a lot of useful information for his later work.

Determined to overcome his technical shortcomings, he gave all this up and moved to Boston in 1999 to resume studies at the New England Conservatory. He spent five years in Boston and met, played and studied with a variety of folks including Steve Lacy, Ran Blake, Dominique Eade, Jerry Bergonzi, Bob Moses, Jim Hobbs and the Either Orchestra. Despite their encouragement, Sinton was overjoyed when he got to leave Boston in 2004.

Since then, Sinton has lived in Brooklyn, New York. He's been fortunate enough to be a long-standing member of Darcy James Argue's Secret Society, the Nate Wooley Quintet, the Andrew D'Angelo DNA Orchestra and Anthony Braxton's Tricentric Orchestra. With these groups he's travelled to several countries in Europe and South America as well as played many festivals (Moers, Newport, BMW, Bergamo, Tampere Jazz Happening, etc.). Sinton is proud of the collaborators he's been able to work with (Kirk Knuffke, Tomas Fujiwara, Chad Taylor, Mary Halvorson, Ingrid Laubrock, Jeremiah Cymerman, Josh Roseman, Harris Eisenstadt, Roswell Rudd, James Fei, Denman Maroney, Han-Earl Park, Greg Tate, Curtis Hasselbring, Mike Pride, Jon Irabagon) but the list of people he still hopes to play with is vast.

As a long-standing member of the Douglass Street Music Collective, Josh Sinton has hosted hundreds of concerts over the past 7 years Brooklyn. His work has been recognized by Downbeat (Critics' and Readers' Poll), Jazz Times (Critics' Poll) and El Intruso (International Critics' Poll) and has been discussed in The Wire, Signal to Noise, Point of Departure, the New York Times and the New York City Jazz Record.

Sinton defines himself as a "creative musician" rather than a jazz musician and has done so since 2011. His reasons for this are varied and personal, but some of them are outlined here and here. Suffice to say, friendly listeners can label him what they will. Sinton will just continue creating sounds with the goal of wasting nobody's time.

Currently Sinton leads the band Ideal Bread as well playing regularly with the Nate Wooley Quintet and the Tricentric Orchestra. He is busy writing new music for himself and his collaborators as well as contributing essays to the websites of Darcy James Argue, Ethan Iverson's Do The Math, Destination: Out and Sound American."