"Joe Morris was born in New Haven, Connecticut on September 13, 1955. At the age of 12 he took lessons on the trumpet for one year. He started on guitar in 1969 at the age of 14. He played his first professional gig later that year. With the exception of a few lessons he is self-taught. The influence of Jimi Hendrix and other guitarists of that period led him to concentrate on learning to play the blues. Soon thereafter his sister gave him a copy of John Coltrane's OM, which inspired him to learn about Jazz and New Music. From age 15 to 17 he attended The Unschool, a student-run alternative high school near the campus of Yale University in downtown New Haven. Taking advantage of the open learning style of the school he spent most of his time day and night playing music with other students, listening to ethnic folk, blues, jazz, and classical music on record at the public library and attending the various concerts and recitals on the Yale campus. He worked to establish his own voice on guitar in a free jazz context from the age of 17. Drawing on the influence of Coltrane, Miles Davis, Cecil Taylor,Thelonius Monk, Ornette Coleman as well as the AACM, BAG, and the many European improvisers of the '70s. Later he would draw influence from traditional West African string music, Messian, Ives, Eric Dolphy, Jimmy Lyons, Steve McCall and Fred Hopkins. After high school he performed in rock bands, rehearsed in jazz bands and played totally improvised music with friends until 1975 when he moved to Boston.

Between 1975 and 1978 he was active on the Boston creative music scene as a soloist as well as in various groups from duos to large ensembles. He composed music for his first trio in 1977. In 1980 he traveled to Europe where he performed in Belgium and Holland. When he returned to Boston he helped to organize the Boston Improvisers Group (BIG) with other musicians. Over the next few years through various configurations BIG produced two festivals and many concerts. In 1981 he formed his own record company, Riti, and recorded his first LpWraparound with a trio featuring Sebastian Steinberg on bass and Laurence Cook on drums. Riti records released four more LPs and CDs before 1991. Also in 1981 he began what would be a six year collaboration with the multi-instrumentalist Lowell Davidson, performing with him in a trio and a duo. During the next few years in Boston he performed in groups which featured among others; Billy Bang, Andrew Cyrille, Peter Kowald, Joe McPhee, Malcolm Goldstein, Samm Bennett, Lawrence "Butch" Morris and Thurman Barker. Between 1987 and 1989 he lived in New York City where he performed at the Shuttle Theater, Club Chandelier, Visiones, Inroads, Greenwich House, etc. as well as performing with his trio at the first festival Tea and Comprovisation held at the Knitting Factory.

In 1989 he returned to Boston. Between 1989 and 1993 he performed and recorded with his electric trio Sweatshop and electric quartet Racket Club. In 1994 he became the first guitarist to lead his own session in the twenty year history of Black Saint/Soulnote Records with the trio recording Symbolic Gesture. Since 1994 he has recorded for the labels ECM, Hat Hut, Leo, Incus, Okka Disc, Homestead, About Time, Knitting Factory Works, No More Records, AUM Fidelity and OmniTone and Avant. He has toured throughout the U.S., Canada and Europe as a solo and as a leader of a trio and a quartet. Since 1993 he has recorded and/or performed with among others; Matthew Shipp, William Parker, Joe and Mat Maneri, Rob Brown, Raphe Malik, Ivo Pearlman, Borah Bergman, Andrea Parkins, Whit Dickey, Ken Vandermark, DKV Trio, Karen Borca, Eugene Chadborne, Susie Ibarra, Hession/Wilkinson/Fell, Roy Campbell Jr., John Butcher, Aaly Trio, Hamid Drake, Fully Celebrated Orchestra and others.

He began playing acoustic bass in 2000 and has since performed with cellist Daniel Levin, Whit Dickey and recorded with pianist Steve Lantner.

He has lectured and conducted workshops trroughout the US and Europe. He is a former member of the faculty of Tufts University Extension College and is currently on the faculty at New England Conservatory in the jazz and improvisation department. He was nominated as Best Guitarist of the year 1998 and 2002 at the New York Jazz Awards."

Detroit-based percussionist Ben Hall is a member of groups Burning Graveyard Lights, Cass Chamber, Death Knell, Graveyards, Hell And Bunny, Jack Wright Nonet, KillDevilHills, Machine Yardz, Mêlée, Psalm Alarm, The New Monuments, Traum, and Trauma, and leads his own Ben Hall's Racehorse Names.

"Andria Nicodemou is a multifaceted musician from Cyprus, specializing in vibraphone and improvisation. She is a graduate from Corfu University in Classical Percussion and has received a Master's Degree from the New England Conservatory, in Contemporary Improvisation.

She has been working in diverse interdisciplinary art projects, with multi-media artists, dancers and actors in Europe and USA. She has worked with musicians such as Joe Morris, Anthony Coleman, Marty Ehrlich, Ikue Morri, Tayler Ho Bynum, Tatsuya Nakatani, Ab Baars, Anne La Berge, Gianni Lenoci, Jim Hobbs, Marc Sanders, among others. She was a guest performer at the London Improvisers Orchestra (2015) and the Royal Improvisers Orchestra in Amsterdam (2014).

Andria is the co-founder of the Thread Ensemble, a story-telling, improvisatory trio a result of a 2012 Ensemble Fellowship in NEC's Community Performances & Partnerships Department. With their unique teaching approach, Thread Ensemble has been performing and giving interactive workshops in the Boston Public Schools, ever since.

With her unique voice she has established herself as one of the important emerging musicians in the experimental, improvised music idioms.

In July of 2014 she received the honorary visa for prominent artistic personalities, 'Artist with an extraordinary ability in the fields of art' from the USA."

"Born in 1990, Dan O'Brien discovered a joy of sound and music throughout his early childhood listening to film scores and his parents' CD collection. At the age of nine he picked up his father's tenor saxophone, taking advantage of all the opportunities he could find in the Canton, CT public school instrumental music program, while starting on a journey into the world of improvisation by listening to his first musical idols, Stan Getz and Sonny Rollins, and composing short pieces that he would record with friends around town. By high school he was studying with local jazz educator John Mills and writing arrangements for the Canton High School jazz combo and big band, in which he was also playing saxophone and clarinet.

Dan's education continued at Western Connecticut State University in Danbury, CT, where he earned the Bachelor of Science in Music Education degree in May 2012. He also completed the BM Jazz Studies coursework and took advantage of the broad experience of the school's faculty, studying saxophone with Dan Goble, Andrew Beals, and Javier Oviedo, composition with Kevin Jay Isaacs and Jamie Begian, clarinet with Paul Garment and Jo-Ann Sternberg, and flute with Dave Noland. As a standout student in the jazz program, he had opportunities to learn from and perform with master guest artists throughout his time at WestConn, including having his big band arrangement of "Joy Spring" critiqued by Maria Schneider, opening for Darcy James Argue's Secret Society, and participating in masterclasses and performances with Benny Golson, Rich Perry, Dave Liebman, John Scofield, Robert Glasper, Rufus Reid, and Dafnis Prieto.

Following WestConn, Dan pursued graduate studies at the University of North Texas, earning the Master of Music in Jazz Studies degree in May 2014, with a concentration in Composition and Arranging. Two years of dedicated study with Rich DeRosa allowed him to explore many compositional media and expand his concept and output beyond standard classifications of genre. His master's recital included a range of work from arrangements of jazz standards to original compositions incorporating free improvisation, an original narrated setting of Connie Wanek's poem "After Us" for small wind ensemble to a passacaglia treatment of Wayne Shorter's "Nefertiti" for chamber orchestra. In March 2014, his arrangement of Duke Ellington's "Come Sunday" was performed at Carnegie Hall by Chris Washburne's SYOTOS Band as one of three winners of the Carnegie Hall Musical Exchange "Arranging Ellington" competition. Beyond these accomplishments, his studies with John Murphy along with access to the enormous music collection at the UNT Willis Library allowed Dan to expand his musical conceptions through in-depth exploration of music by Tim Berne, Anthony Braxton, Igor Stravinsky, Karlheinz Stockhausen, John Corigliano, Duke Ellington, George Lewis, George Russell, Henry Threadgill, and many other artists who have made profound contributions to music.

After graduating from UNT, Dan returned to Connecticut to take an Artist Instructor position at the Greater Hartford Academy of the Arts, directing the award-winning Jazz Ensemble 3, arranging for and co-directing "The Real Ambassadors" Jazz Choir, and teaching courses in harmony/eartraining/jazz theory, improvisation, and jazz history. He has continued his studies, taking lessons with Ellery Eskelin (improvisation/solo saxophone) and Darcy James Argue (composition), and regularly attending the Improvisations series at Real Art Ways in Hartford to learn about free improvisation from Stephen Haynes and Joe Morris with guest artists. Dan is a member of the George Mastrogiannis Quintet playing woodwinds and plays tenor saxophone with the Nobuki Takamen Quartet. With fellow WCSU graduates Grant Beale, Silvain Castellano, and Dave Campbell he has co-founded the group Dagrasida, which has an emphasis on free improvisation and original composition."

Allison Burik: "Saxophonist - Vocalist - Composer - Arranger

Kansas City native Allison Burik is a saxophonist and composer based in Boston. During her time in Kansas City she performed as a featured artist at venues such as the Kauffman Center for Performing Arts, Take Five Coffee+Bar, and the Nelson Atkins Museum of Art. Burik attended Berklee College of Music and received her Bachelors Degree in Performance in 2016. She is currently pursuing her Master's degree in Contemporary Improvisation at the New England Conservatory while maintaining an active career as a performer. She seeks to explore differing worlds of sonic possibilities through her many projects. Burik has released a solo EP, "Some Days Like This," (2019) a quartet album, "Mythos," (2016) and will be releasing a duo album fall of 2019 with guitarist Magdalena Abrego. Their duo goes by the name Umbrella Pine and since 2013 the two have been steadily cultivating their sound through original compositions and improvisation. Since arriving in Boston in 2013, Burik has become an internationally known artist, having performed in festivals, residencies, and concerts in places as far reaching as France, South Korea, and Canada. Burik has been on tour with a number of bands, including Jonah Francese's Thinkin' Big Band, which actively plays in venues across New York, Boston, and Philadelphia. Burik went on tour in South Korea with the Dabin Ryu Quintet in July 2019. They played in venues throughout Seoul, Busan, and Gwangju. Over the years Allison has studied with notable musicians including George Garzone, Joe Morris, Ingrid Laubrock, Ran Blake, Carla Kilhstedt, Anthony Coleman, Frank Tiberi, Bobby Watson, Jaleel Shaw, Shannon LeClaire, and Tia Fuller. In August 2017, she attended the Banff Jazz and Creative Music Workshop in Alberta Canada, under the curation of Vijay Iyer. There, she participated in ensembles led by internationally known musicians including Tyshawn Sorey, Imani Uzuri, Matthew Stevens, and Jeremy Pelt."