"Rüdiger Carl, Born 1944, Goldap (East Prussia); accordion, saxophone, clarinet, arranger, composer.

Rüdiger Carl has been involved in improvised music from 1968, recording his first record in January 1972 and then playing with a wide range of musicians including Arjen Gorter, Makaya Ntshoko, Louis Moholo, Maarten van Regteren Altena, Tristan Honsinger, Johnny Dyani and Han Bennink. His long-standing partnership with Irene Schweizer began in 1973 and continues to the present day and for a three year period, from 1973 to 1976 he was also a member of Globe Unity Orchestra. He began to give solo performances in 1977 and in 1978 started two other long-term professional partnerships, with Sven-Åke Johansson and Hans Reichel. All three musicians were members of the Bergisch-Brandenburgisches Quartett (the fourth member being Ernst-Ludwig Petrowsky) and they have both appeared in duos with Carl, Carl and Johansson are members of the 'Swing Dance Band' (with Alexander von Schlippenbach and Jay Oliver), Carl and Reichel have been members of the September Band since 1993, and the trio of Carl/Reichel/Johansson has itself been performing since 1994 (see below).

Rüdiger Carl has probably made the most striking change in improvised music, virtually forsaking the quintessentially jazz instrument - the tenor saxophone - and taking up one with totally different associations and means of expression: the accordion. This was manifest in recordings on Buben, his duets with Hans Reichel, and though he continued to play the two instruments virtually side-by-side ( in addition to clarinet), the - what some might deem to be drastic - move was completed and cemented on Vorn which even featured a version of Paul McCartney's Those were the days. Following this recording, the COWWS Quintet was formed, continuing Carl's musical relationship with Schweizer and adding Philipp Wachsmann, Jay Oliver and Stephen Wittwer. While quite varied moods are apparent from the recorded output of the group, the lasting impression is one of folk and song influences, emphasised by Carl's accordion. With the death of Oliver in 1993, the bass chair was taken by Barre Phillips for approximately one year and then by Arjen Gorter.

Rüdiger Carl has continued to work with other musicians in addition to COWWS. Thus, the Canvas Trio was formed in 1991 with Joëlle Léandre and Carlos Zingaro, and in the same year he played in duos with Mayo Thompson of the Red Crayolas (who contributed to the second COWWS record) and Joëlle Léandre. From 1988 to 1992 he was concert organiser of 'Musik im Portikus' in Frankfurt/M. and from 1994 has been leader of the F.I.M. Orchester in Frankfurt/M. His most recent involvements have been in an occasional duo with Burkhard Kunkel, zither and in the ironic electronics trio Blank with Oliver Augst and Christoph Korn. Over a three-year period Blank worked with American painter and poet Raymond Pettibon, initially at the Philharmonie in Cologne (released on GROB) and later documented in the hörspiel Long live the people of the revolution, released on Eventuell."

"For a number of years now, energetic double bassist, filmmaker and producer Grip has played an important role for the new scenes of improvised music in Europe. As founder of Umlaut Records, he opened up for creative forms of organizing collectives of musicians and promoting their music internationally. Since 2003 he has been one of the main organizers of Hagenfesten in Dala-Floda, Sweden, a stand-alone festival, and quite frankly possibly the most pleasant venue for free improvised music not only in Sweden but in the whole of Europe. Few other places offer quite the same endearing combination of sophisticated musical risk-taking, and up-beat, social get-together. GripÕs musicianship is informed by a similar knack for welding musical sophistication with social communication, often with an analog film camera at hand. With a handful of short films Joel Grip met mexican filmmaker Mauricio Hern‡ndez and shortly the film production company Umlicht was established. They are right now working on their third and forth feature film together. Umdicht is amplifying the pencil of Joel GripÕs hand, partly through the irregular issue of Lšsa Blad and partly in the future release of books."

"Sven-Åke Johansson (born 1943 in Mariestad, living in Berlin since 1968) is a Swedish drummer and composer associated with free jazz and free improvisation. He was in the Globe Unity Orchestra and played with German reedist Alfred Harth and Belgian pianist Nicole Van den Plas in E.M.T.."