"New York City-based German-French bassist, composer and improviser Pascal Niggenkemper is a performing and recording artist active on the creative music scene in the US and in Europe.

From 1999-2005 he was musicaly active in Cologne having studied jazz & classical double bass at the Hochschule für Musik. In 2005 he received the DAAD award and moved to New York.

From 2008 to 2010 Pascal led the PNTrio with Tyshawn Sorey and Robin Verheyen. (CD "pasàpas" Konnex 2008 & "urban creatures" JazzHausMusik 2010). The trio toured extensively in Europe performing at the Jazzcologne Festival, Jazzherbst Konstanz and at the Kennedy Center in Washington. Recordings for the WDR and the BR Radio.

In cooperation with Jazzdor Strasbourg-Berlin, Pascal formed the septet vision7 that performed at Jazzdor Strasbourg-Berlin, Vive le Jazz in Cologne, Jazz à la Cité in Paris and at the Pori Jazz in Finland. (CD 'Lucky Prime' clean feed records Sept 2013)

In September 2011 Pascal released with Simon Nabatov and Gerald Cleaver the CD/LP upcoming hurricane on NoBusiness Records which is listed among 'Albums of the year' 2011 in the 'The New York City Jazz Record'. The trio performed in Canada and the USA.

He recently recorded a new solo program called: 'look with thine ears' music for bass & preparations was premiered at the Jazzdor Festival in Strasbourg in November 2013. The CD was released in March 2015 on clean feed records. He performed for the France Musique radio broadcast by Anne Montaron called 'a l'improviste'.

In 2014 he presented the double trio 'le 7eme continent' with the program 'talking trash' at the Vive le Jazz festival in Cologne, Germany and the concert was broadcast by WDR3 radio. Their CD was released in May 2016 on clean feed records and the group performed in France, Belgium and Germany.

Pascal is co-leading the groups baloni with Frantz Loriot viola and Joachim Badenhorst clarinets (CD 'fremdenzimmer' 2011, 'Belleke' 2014 & 'Ripples' 2015 clean feed records) PascAli a duo for two prepared basses with Sean Ali (CD 'suspicious activity' creative sources 2012) and Miner's Pick with Thomas Heberer. (CD 'miner's pick' FMR records 2014)

With friends, he curates in NY the house concert series ze couch, where every month artists meet to present their work.

Festival presence includes: Jazzdor Strasbourg-Berlin, Vision Festival New York, Umbrella Festival Chicago, Banlieues Bleues Paris, Strade del Cinema Aosta, météo Mulhouse, Jazzcologne, JIGG Lisbon, Taktlos Zurich, Jazz à la Cité in Paris, ESCUCHA Madrid, Washington DC Jazz Festival, Pori Jazz Festival, Middelheim Antwerp, Grenzenlos Köln, undead Jazzfest NYC, D'Jazz Nevers, NewAdits Klagenfurt, Font New York, Music Unlimited Wels, Vive le Jazz Cologne, GONG Aarau, Konfrontationen Nickelsdorf, Ljubljana Jazz Festival etc...

He received the following scholarships/grants: DAAD, Henry Mancini Institute, North Rhine-Westphalia composition stipend."

"Ben Lamar is a prolific composer, vocalist, trumpeter, producer, and music educator. Lamar began his musical journey with the initial influence of his father's diverse vinyl collection and his family's unique music listening rituals. He has been creating music professionally for over 20 years now - performing, recording, producing for, and studying with a number of vital figures in the world of music, including Jazz, Blues, Hip-Hop and Electronic."

"Elisabeth Coudoux (born Fügemann) is a cellist at the interface of different musical genres: free improvisation, experimental music, new composed music and jazz. After studying classical studies as a basis, a jazz study was conducted in Cologne with Frank Gratkowski and Prof. Dieter Manderscheid. In addition to her own project (eg Emissatett for what she composed), she is a cellist in many ensembles and works in interdisciplinary projects with dancers, visual artists and writers. She is the initiator and member of IMPAKT, a newly founded collective for free improvisation in Cologne."

"Ricardo Jacinto / Lisbon (1975). Lives and works in Lisbon and Belfast. Working as an artist and musician mainly focusing on the relation of sound and space. Currently pursuing a PHD at the Sonic Arts Research Center / Belfast. Graduated in Architecture at the University of Lisbon-Faculty of Architecture, and Sculpture and Advanced Visual Arts at Ar.Co / Lisbon. Graduate courses at the School of Visual Arts, New York. Musical studies at the Hot Clube de Portugal and Academia de Amadores de Música / Lisbon. Since 1998 has presented his work in individual and group exhibitions, concerts and performances, in Portugal and abroad. Has collaborated extensively with other artists, musicians, architects and performers. Founder of OSSO - Cultural Association

Presented is installation work in several contemporary art venues in Portugal and across Europe: Projet Room CCB_Lisboa, Círculo de Belas Artes em Madrid, MUDAM_Luxemburgo, Centro Cultural Gulbenkian_Paris, Manifesta 08_European Bienal de Arte Contemporânea de Itália, Loraine Frac- Metz, OK CENTRE_Linz_Austria, CHIADO 8_Culturgest_Lisbon, Casa da Música / Porto e Bienal de Arquitetura de Veneza de 2006.

As a cellist has mainly worked in the field of free improvised music playing in several formations and with different musicans: Nuno Torres, Rodrigo Pinheiro, David Maranha, Hernani Faustino, Ernesto Rodrigues, Luis Lopes, Ricardo Guerreiro, C Spencer Yeh, Shiori Usui, Manuel Mota, Pedro Rebelo, Franziska Schroeder, Simon Rose, Paul Stapletton, Jean Luc-Guionnet, Gabriel Ferrandini, Orquestra de geometria variável, PinkDraft, Cacto, FOIRMFADA, among others. Has played in different venues in Portugal and abroad: Fundação de Serralves / Porto, Palais Tokyo / Paris, SARC / Belfast, Festival VERBO / São Paulo, Festival Temps d' Images_Lisbon, Festival Rescaldo_Lisbon, Festival BigBang_CCB_Lisbon, Culturgest_Porto e Lisboa, ZDB / Lisboa, Dança Base_Edimbrugh, Kabinett 0047_Oslo, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian / Paris, among others."

"Felicie Bazelaire is a cello and double bass player based in Paris. She shares her time in different ways : between concerts and performances, studying pedagogy through a Masters degree at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Paris, and teaching at the Orsay and Auxerre's conservatory. She is interested in classical music (chamber music) and contemporary music with her solo projects (improvisation, compositions, performances/actions...), the Hodos ensemble and the ONCEIM (a french improvised large orchestra led by Frederic Blondy). She is curious about the link between musicians, composers, improvisers and the actual music."

"Liz Kosack is a musician and designer from Maine, USA working in Berlin and New York. Her work is cross-platform, but focuses around synthesizer playing and masks.

She completed a Masters in music at Jazz Institut Berlin, where she studied composition with John Hollenbeck and Greg Cohen. She holds a BA in jazz piano from William Paterson University, USA. She was a finalist in music and sound for the New York Foundation for the Arts fellowship in 2013.

She currently co-leads and is involved in multiple active projects in both Germany and the USA, released two LPs with "VAX" (The Sooner we Jump the Better, and Count to VAX) Is on RJ Miller's "Ronalds Rhythm," released a debut tape cassette with The Hero of Warchester in 2015 on Prom Night Records, Sunrise Over a Dystopic Future City's debut Dystopia (DVD collaboration with NYC filmaker Zach Caldwell, 2016) and expects to shortly release the resultant album of her masters project which features text-encoded melodic compositions and the talent of Frank Gratkowski, Tilo Weber, Dan Peter Sundland, Christian Tschuggnall, and Otis Sandsjö (selections of which were exhibited in fall 2014 at NYFA's "Estuary" exhibit in DUMBO, brooklyn.) Noteably this year she played the Moers festival with her band "The Liz" as Anubis in their piece "Book of Birds," collaborated with the Ballet im Revier, and in september gave her German professional debut on grand piano in a special version of RRR at the 30 Jahr Stadtgarten festival.

Liz is a sideman on Tilo Weber's Animate Repose (Shoebill 2016), and special guest on Orter Eparg's "Orter Eparg" (Øra, 2016.) She also plays synth on Lea Frey's next album, due for release 2017.

She leads mask-making workshops, has been commisioned for mask works by various groups, and is accepting new requests."

"Philip Zoubek (* 1978 in Tulln an der Donau ) is an Austrian pianist of the New Improvisation Music. A striking feature is his highly energetic play, the limits of the pianos, which also include preparation techniques and actions inside the instrument.

Zoubek studied piano at the Conservatory of the City of Vienna from 1996 onwards. He founded the Ubik quartet and took lessons with Uli Scherer before he enrolled at the Musikhochschule Vienna. In 2002 he moved to Cologne, where he studied with Hans Lüdemann, Frank Gratkowski and Marc Ducret. He founded the multimedia project Cauldron, with whom he won the composition competition of the bunker Ulmenwall Bielefeld and the cultural promotion award of the city of Herford; a DVD Q-Spektrum was created in 2003. With the group Snaut with Richard Koch (tp), Eric Schaefer (dr) and Christian Rainer (voice), he toured through Germany and Switzerland and became a prizewinner of the avant-garde competition for Young culture at the Düsseldorfer Altstadtherbst. Since 2004 he belongs to Achim Tang's Trio Torn, which performed successfully in 2011 in a quartet version at the Moers Festival. He was a member of the James Choice Orchestra ( Live at Moers, 2005), Ensemble Creativ, Org, Camera Obscura and the trio Muche / Zoubek / Tang. As a composer Philip Zoubek appeared with his own formation Philz. He also worked with Paul Lytton, Carl Ludwig Hübsch, Ernst Glerum, Herb Robertson, Wilbert de Joode and Christian Thomé.

In 2008 he received the Horst and Gretl Will scholarship for Jazz / Improvised Music of the City of Cologne. Also in 2008 he founded the Trio Z3 with Benjamin Weidekamp and Christian Weber. The formation Z3 was born out of the idea of ​​the music of the Jimmy Giuffre -Trios of the 1960s."

"After having studied classical music with Jacques Di Donato, Joris Rühl oriented himself towards contemporary music, written, improvised and jazz, with a predilection for projects blurring the borders between these different labels. He plays with contemporary music ensembles like L'Instant Donné or Hiatus, with jazz ensembles like TØRN, Hübsch 8, Simon Rummel Ensemble and with the experimental music ensembles ONCEIM and Spat' Sonore. He also improvises with, among many others, Michel Doneda, Thierry Madiot, Isabelle Duthoît, Eve Risser, Antez. His discography includes discs released under the labels Neos Jazz, Satelita, OBS and Umlaut Records. Beside this activity of musician, he also works on films and experimental videos."

"Joachim Badenhorst (°1981 Antwerp) has been active in the experimental and improvised music scene in Europe and abroad for the past 15 years. Following his master degree in jazz studies at the Royal Conservatory of the Hague, he has since divided his time between Belgium and cities in the US and Europe, collaborating and recording with jazz and experimental music ensembles and artists, such as Han Bennink, Tony Malaby and Noël Akchoté while incessantly exploring the visceral elements of sound. His output ranges from solo improvisation to leading large formations, such as his own Carate Urio Orchestra.

Badenhorst is artistically interested in integrating ideas from various different art medias into his musical compositions. He also takes deep interest in revealing the inherent relation between contemporary and traditional musics, having collaborated with traditional musicians from Turkey and Japan, and toured in China with reinterpreted traditional Chinese music.

In recent years, Badenhorst is contemplating the evanescent site specificity of sound as well as the relation between space and sound. In recent years, his work has taken a deeper focus on composition, namely that of computer­based composition and processing. Through continual research and experiment, he delves into a re­imagination of the boundaries between improvisation and composition, of abstract sound explorations and harmonic passage, and continues to attempt at a personal aesthetic language that interact with spaces and engage with different audiences.

Badenhorst appears on over 50 cd's on over 10 record labels. In 2012, he launched his own label KLEIN, as a creative platform to initiate collaborations, experiment and play with unconventional design, and as an outlet for fringe musical projects.

Since 2010 Badenhorst has been developing his solo programme consisting of improvisations and compositions for solo acoustic and electro­acoustic wind instruments."