Born in Rome where he has been active for many years both as a musician and organizer in the field of experimental and improvised music. Founding member of Ossatura, 7k Oaks, Eco d'Alberi, Weightless, Truth in the Abstract Blues and has worked, amongst others, with Peter Kowald, Mike Cooper, Wadada Leo Smith, Butch Morris, ROVA, Blast, Lisle Ellis, Larry Ochs, John Butcher, John Edwards, Evan Parker, Alfred Harth, Tim Hodgkinson, Wolfgang Fuchs, Thomas Lehn, Michel Doneda, Lol Coxhill, Veryan Weston, Hans Koch and Axel Dorner.

"- Andreas Willers

- started out as a blues- and avantgarde guitarist, first outing 1981 on the FMP label (Hier & Als Auch, solo guitar),

- studied el.guitar and composition in Los Angeles (MI), Hamburg (HfM) and Banff (Canada),

-has played and/or recorded with Tom Arthurs, Steve Argüelles, Conny, Johannes & Matthias Bauer, Franz Bauer, Florian Bergmann, Jim Black, Samuel Blaser, Paul Bley, Kent Carter, Audrey Chen, Günter Christmann, Alvin Curran, Tobias Delius, Yorgos Dimitriadis, Axel Dörner, Wilbert De Joode, Michel Doneda, Mark Dresser, Marc Ducret, Silke Eberhard, Dirk Engelhardt, Mark Feldman, Rudi Fischerlehner, Alexander Frangenheim, Alain Grange, Lou Grassi, Frank Gratkowski, Phillip Greenlief, Michael Griener, Christof Griese, Trilok Gurtu, Roger Hanschel, Ratzo Harris, Gabriele Hasler, Phil Haynes, Thomas Heberer, Thomas Heidepriem, Gerry Hemingway, Devin Hoff, Tristan Honsinger, Carl L. Hübsch, Jörg Huke, Hui-Chun Lin, Dieter Ilg, Paul Imm, Thomy Jordi, Anders Jormin, Theo Jörgensmann, Kai Kanthak, Achim Kaufmann, Martin Klingeberg, Willi Kellers, Meinrad Kneer, Frank Köllges, Uwe Kropinski, Klaus Kürvers, Almut Kühne, Klaus Kugel, Ingrid Laubrock, Urs Leimgruber, Dave Liebman, Martin Lillich, Christian Lillinger, Hans Lüdemann, H.D. Lorenz, Dieter Manderscheid, Rita Marcotulli, Christian Marien, Lisa Mezzacappa, Jordina Millá, Matthias Müller, David Murray, Glen Moore, Nikolaus Neuser, Rudi Neuwirth, Lauren Newton, Horst Nonnenmacher, Lothar Ohlmeier, E.L. Petrowski, Dominique Pifarély, Elvira Plenar, Oliver Potratz, Bobby Previte, Claudio Puntin, Tom Rainey, Enrico Rava, Dirk Raulf, Hugo Read, Yves Robert, Herb Robertson, Michael Rodach, Jan Roder, Simon Rose, Olaf Rupp, Julie Sassoon, Volker Schlott, Andreas Schmidt, Niko Schäuble, Frank Paul Schubert, Matthias Schubert, Frank Schulte, Dorothea Schürch, Louis Sclavis, Elliot Sharp, Arkady Shilkloper, Marvin Smitty Smith, Ches Smith, Fabrizio Spera, Oli Steidle, Bob Stewart, Christof Thewes, Gebhard Ullmann, Peter Van Huffel, Petras Vysniauskas, Henrik Walsdorff, Ute Wassermann, Kathie Webster, Tim Wells, Fritz Witteck, Hannes Zerbe a.m.m.

- toured Europe, Africa, the Middle East, Australia/New Zealand and Southeast Asia for the Goethe Institut; festival appearences include Vancouver, Vienna, Salzburg, Melbourne, Madrid, Vigo, Cheltenham, Bern, Jakarta, Istanbul, Wroclaw, Monterrey, Sibiu, Amsterdam, Münster, Moers, Köln, Leverkusen, Vilshoven, Kiel, Viersen, Berlin, Freiberg, tours throughout the USA and Europe in places like The Stone, The Knitting Factory, Onkel Pö's amm

- has composed for the Jazz Baltica Ensemble, the NDR Bigband, different New Music ensembles, several scholarships and awards, founding member of the musicians cooperative Jazzfront Berlin-Brandenburg, was member of the Initiative Kölner Jazzhaus,

- taught electric guitar at the Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler, Berlin, from 1991-96, wrote workshop articles for the German Gitarre&Bass magazine on improvisation and performance."

"Born December 13, 1938, Providence, Rhode Island. From five years: piano lessons, trombone, marching bands, Synagogue chants, Jazz, and his father's dance bands. Becomes an artist at age 13 in an apple tree at the house of his lifelong friend, poet Clark Coolidge. Hears Spike Jones, the Rhode Island Philharmonic, Satchmo, The Boston Symphony Orcherstra, Art Tatum, Charlie Parker, The Band of America, Thelonius Monk, Gerry Mulligan, Miles Davis, Coltrane, Bartok and Christian Wolff.

With a fortuitous bang, he begins his musical journey (1965 in Rome) as co-founder of the radical music collective Musica Elettronica Viva, as a solo performer, and as a composer for Rome's avantgarde theater scene. In the 70's, he creates a poetic series of solo works for synthesizer, voice, taped sounds and found objects. Seeking to develop new musical spaces, and now considered one of the leading figures in making music outside of the concert halls -- he develops a series of concerts for lakes, ports, parks, buildings, quarries and caves -- his natural laboratories. In the 1980's, he extends the ideas of musical geography by creating simultaneous radio concerts for three, then six large ensembles performing together from many European Capitals. By connecting digital samplers to MIDI Grands (Diskklavier) and computers, since 1987, he produces an enriched body of solo performance works -- an ideal synthesis between the concert hall and all sounding phenomena in the world. He creates a visually striking series of sound installations, some of them in collaboration with visual artists including Paul Klerr, Melissa Gould, Kristin Jones, Pietro Fortuna, Umberto Bignardi, Uli Sigg. Throughout these years he continues to write numerous pieces for radio and for acoustic instruments.

Studies composition with Ron Nelson (B.A. Brown University 1960) and with Elliott Carter and Mel Powell ( M.Mus., Yale School of Music 1963). During summer vacations, plays European crossings with the "Brunotes" on the Holland American Line, in a Greek Dance Band in the Catskills, and in the Dunes Hotel in Las Vegas.

Continues studies and friendship with Carter in Berlin (1964 Ford Foundation Grant), meets Stravinsky, Xenakis, Berio, Yuji Takahashi, Andriessen, Remo Remotti, and above all Rzewski. Goes to Darmstadt, hangs with Babbitt and Earl Brown, hears Stockhausen and Ligeti. Goes to Rome with Joel Chadabe and plays piano in bars on via Veneto, meets Franco Evangelisti and Cornelius Cardew.

In the Musica Elettronica Viva years (1966 -1971 in Rome), performs in over 200 concerts in Europe and the USA with Teitelbaum and Rzewski, Carol Plantamura, Ivan Vandor, Alan Bryant and Jon Phetteplace; and makes significant artistic encounters with Giuseppe Chiari, Edith Schloss, AMM, Cardew, Steve Lacy, Michelangelo Pistoletto, Steve ben Israel, Anthony Braxton, Simone Forti, Steve Reich, Joan La Barbara, Michael Nyman, La Monte Young, Trisha Brown, Ashley, Behrman, Gordon Mumma, Alvin Lucier, Larry Austin, Bill Smith, Ketoff, Robert Moog, Nuova Consonanza, MEV2, Meme Perlini, Mario Ricci, Maria Monti, Prima Materia, Ron Bunzl, Phil Glass, Charlemagne Palestine, Terry Riley, George Lewis, Evan Parker, Gregory Reeves, Serge Tcherepnin, Kosugi, Pulsa, Maryanne Amacher, John Cage, David Tudor, Morton Feldman. Scelsi becomes his friend and mentor.

From 1975-80 taught vocal improvisation at the Accademia Nazionale d'Arte Drammatica (Rome) and from 1991 to 2006 was the Milhaud Professor of Composition at Mills College in Oakland, California. Currently teaching privately in Rome in addition to master classes, residencies, and lectures at Oberlin, Peabody, Brown, Berkeley, The Hague, Haifa, Bolzano, Northwestern, Yale, Beijing, etc."

"Born Lucerne, 1952; saxophones, composer.

Urs Leimgruber has been active for many years in the areas of contemporary improvisation, composition, jazz and new music. One of his earliest associations was as a member of the electric jazz/free music group 'Om' with Christy Doran, Fredy Studer and Bobby Burri, and he later formed the 'Reflexionen' quartet with Don Friedman and Bobby Burri in New York. More recently, his own projects have included 'Ensemble Bleu', 'Xylem', e_a.sonata 02 with the ARTE saxophone quartet, as well as a long association with Fritz Hauser: as a duo with the ongoing Music for saxophone and percussion; in the Leimgruber/Roidinger/Hauser trio; a trio with Joëlle Léandre; and a trio with Marilyn Crispell. He later formed the 'quartet noir' with Marilyn Crispell, Joëlle Léandre and Fritz Hauser, a trio with Jacques Demierre and Barre Phillips and the group SIX with Jacques Demierre, Isabelle Duthoit, Charlotte Hug, Dorothea Schürch and Thomas Lehn. Urs Leimgruber has also performed extensively as a solo artist and has been involved in mixed media presentations, providing music for dance, radio plays and film.

Urs Leimgruber has undertaken concert tours in Western and Eastern Europe, USA, Canada, South America and Japan, and appeared at concerts and on recordings with such musicians as Steve Lacy, Fred Frith, Evan Parker, Joe McPhee, Lauren Newton, Michel Doneda, Keith Rowe, Günter Christmann, Sunny Murray and Günter Müller among many others."