"Tyshawn Sorey (born July 8, 1980 in Newark, New Jersey) is an American musician and composer who plays drum set, percussion, trombone and piano.

Since graduating from William Paterson University, Sorey has been a sought-after musician in many different musical idioms. He is both a performer and composer, and has had works reviewed in The Wire, The New York Times, The Village Voice, Modern Drummer and Down Beat. In August 2009, Sorey was given the opportunity to curate a month of performances at the Stone, a New York performance space owned by John Zorn. He was selected as an Other Minds 17 (2012).

Sorey recently completed a Master of Arts in composition at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut. In the fall of 2011, he began pursuing doctoral work in composition at Columbia University.

To date, Sorey has released four albums as a leader: That/Not (2007, Firehouse 12 Records), Koan (2009, 482 Music), Oblique (2011, Pi Recordings) and Alloy (2014, Pi Recordings). He has recorded or performed with musicians including Wadada Leo Smith, Steve Coleman, Anthony Braxton, John Zorn, Steve Lehman, Joey Baron, Muhal Richard Abrams, Pete Robbins, Vijay Iyer, Dave Douglas, Butch Morris and Sylvie Courvoisier, among many others."

"Adam O'Farrill is a trumpet player and composer from Brooklyn, NY. As a trumpeter, he has performed and/or recorded with artists such as Rudresh Mahanthappa, Mary Halvorson, Arturo O'Farrill, Mulatu Astatke, Brasstracks, Stephan Crump, Onyx Collective, Anna Webber, and Samora Pinderhughes. As a composer and bandleader, he has led the quartet, Stranger Days, comprised of Chad Lefkowitz-Brown, Walter Stinson, and Zack O'Farrill. Their eponymous debut (2016, Sunnyside Records) was inspired by film and literature, while the follow-up album, El Maquech (2018, Biophilia Records) covered everything from Mexican folk music to Irving Berlin, as well as O'Farrill's original compositions. Both were critically acclaimed, with the New York Times writing of the first release, "Marshaling a sharp band of his peers, Mr. O'Farrill establishes both a firm identity and a willful urge to stretch and adapt.". The latter album was listed as one of the best jazz albums of 2018 by the NPR Jazz Critics Poll, The Boston Globe, and Nextbop. Adam's newest project, Bird Blown Out of Latitude, is an electro-acoustic nonet, playing original music inspired by the feeling of being pushed off a perceived path.

O'Farrill comes from a rich musical background, with his grandfather being the Afro-Cuban-Irish composer and arranger Chico O'Farrill, his father being the cultural boundary-pushing composer and pianist Arturo O'Farrill, his mother Alison Deane being a classical pianist and educator, and his brother Zack O'Farrill being a drummer, composer, and educator. Adam is of Mexican, Cuban, and Irish heritage on his dad's side, and Eastern European Jewish and African-American on his mom's side. This, combined with growing up in a place of immense cultural diversity, has shaped his tendency to break stylistic borders within not only his original music, but also in terms of who he works with a sideman. O'Farrill was subject of an article in Jazztimes entitled, "Adam O'Farrill Does Not Play Latin Jazz", where he spoke about the unfair treatment and pigeonholing of Latinx musicians.

Adam made his professional recording debut on Chad Lefkowitz-Brown's debut album, Imagery Manifesto, in 2013. In 2015, he appeared on two critically acclaimed records; Rudresh Mahanthappa's Bird Calls and Arturo O'Farrill's Cuba: The Conversation Continues. Adam toured internationally with Mahanthappa's band from 2014 to 2017, performing at the Newport Jazz Festival, Chicago Symphony Hall, North Sea Jazz Festival, Cape Town International Jazz Festival, and more. In 2016, in addition to releasing Stranger Days, O'Farrill appeared on Stephan Crump's album, Rhombal, also garnering acclaim. Other projects he has recorded include Stimmerman (eponymous debut), Olli Hirvonen's New Helsinki, Gabriel Zucker's Weighting, and Onyx Collective's Lower East Suite Part One. Adam will also be featured on upcoming albums from Mary Halvorson, Anna Webber, Raf Vertessen, Thomas Champagne, and Idan Morim.

Adam studied at Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School, and obtained his Bachelor of Music degree from the Manhattan School of Music. He's studied trumpet with Jim Seeley, Nathan Warner, and Thomas Smith, and composition with Reiko Fueting and Curtis Macdonald. In 2014, O'Farrill won 3rd place honors at the Thelonious Monk Institute Jazz Trumpet Competition. He was also a recipient of the ASCAP Herb Albert Young Jazz Composer Award in 2013.

"Mark Shim is a jazz tenor saxophonist. Born in Kingston, Jamaica, Shim's family moved to Canada when he was eight and then settled in Richmond, Virginia five years later. He started on sax in seventh grade, graduating from high school in 1991 and attending Virginia Commonwealth University and William Paterson College. In 1994 he moved to Brooklyn, where he played and recorded with Hamiett Bluiett in Harlem. He then played with Elvin Jones, Mose Allison, Betty Carter, Greg Osby, and the Mingus Big Band. Shim's debut record for Blue Note appeared in 1998, with two more following on the label in 2000."

"Lex Korten is an award winning pianist and composer from New York City who has become an integral voice in the contemporary Jazz and improvised music scene in his home city and a rising star in the worldwide Jazz community. Korten's name has appeared in the New York Times and Vogue magazine, and he's established a resilient presence in the projects of artists such as MacArthur Fellow/Pulitzer Prize finalist Tyshawn Sorey, and Thelonious Monk Competition winner/Blue Note recording artist Melissa Aldana. Korten has otherwise found himself in demand by great musical luminaries including Jaleel Shaw, Mike Moreno, Joel Ross, Caroline Davis, Robert Hurst, Ari Hoenig, Jonathan Kreisberg, Joe Farnsworth, John Ellis, Dayna Stephens and Clarence Penn, as well as a near-comprehensive list of his own generation's most prominent bandleaders in Jazz and Black American Music.

Lex Korten has had ample opportunity to learn from some of the most dedicated and loving mentors in the piano pantheon, most formatively with Geri Allen and Benny Green. To help represent America's great original art form, a music with social purpose and irrevocable partnership with African-American heritage, is a privilege and responsibility Korten strives to fulfill every day. He has been fortunate enough to perform in service of this ideal at an extensive list of the most illustrious festivals and clubs on 5 continents.

In 2020, Lex Korten won the UNISA International Jazz Piano Competition and released his solo piano debut "Foreword" the following year, and continues to cultivate longstanding relationships with NYC venues like The Jazz Gallery, Mezzrow and Ornithology as a regular bandleader.

Lex has taught pianists from all over the world privately and through The New School for Jazz and Contemporary Music."

"Allen grew up in Temple Hills, Maryland and began playing the recorder when he was three; his father teaches in Washington DC public schools. At first he listened to R&B and rock'n'roll, which led him to learn guitar. After taking lessons, his guitar teacher introduced him to music by Carlos Santana and Eric Clapton . Eventually he started playing the occasional electric bass and double bass that his father owned, and he soon became more drawn to the bass. In high school he played in the string orchestra, jazz ensemble, and in his local parish. Later he also played in the wind ensemble and djembé in the African dance and music program.

During his studies at the Eastman School of Music , where he studied with James VanDemark and Jeff Campbell, he worked with various groups in Rochester, New York. In 2016, Allen received the Rochester Links Scholarship Award; In 2017 he obtained a Bachelor of Music in classical bass and jazz bass. He then continued his studies at Berklee College of Music , where he received his Master of Arts. In Boston he played among other things. with Ralph Peterson , George Garzone and Jerry Bergonzi , later in New York with Rodney Green , Kyle Benford and David Weiss . He also performs regularly in Washington DC and Baltimore, including. in clubs like Blues Alley , Twins Jazz Club, Bohemian Caverns and the Kennedy Center . At the end of 2019 he released the album The Bond: Chants of the Political Prisoner with his own compositions under his own name ; further recordings have been made so far with Luke Norris ( Northern song) and Jennifer Bellor ( Stay ). Allen lives in Brooklyn."

"Called "a thrilling improviser" by Downbeat magazine, Fay Victor consistently hones a unique vision of the vocalist's role in jazz and improvised music. Victor's eight (8) critically acclaimed recordings as a leader since the late 90's has seen praise in venerable media outlets such as Downbeat, JazzTimes, The New York Times, The Village Voice, Time Out New York, The Wire, Signal to Noise, Popmatters.com, The San Francisco Chronicle, Time Out Chicago, The Chicago Reader, The New York City Jazz Record and JazzWise (UK). Victor's long standing group, the Fay Victor Ensemble - an expansive and cohesive mix of jazz, rock, blues, new music and free improvisation - released three albums to huge critical acclaim (2009's The FreeSong Suite made it onto numerous year-end lists including The Village Voice, NPR and Popmatters.com). The experimental blues project The Exposed Blues Duo, with FVE guitarist Anders Nilsson delving deep into a variety of blues forms released Bare in 2010. There is Herbie Nichols SUNG, Victor's homage to the unsung be-bop pianist incorporating Victor's lyrics and arrangements in a quintet and trio format. The trio project has been recorded and currently looking for label support for release and 2018 will see Victor release Wet Robots on ESP-DISK, a brand new vehicle for fresh sounds and improvisational approaches in a group called SoundNoiseFUNK.

In addition to Victor's band-leading vehicles on record, her voice has attracted esteemed ensembles including Other Dimensions in Music (ODIM), the perennial free jazz outfit joined forces with Victor for 2011's Kaiso Stories on Silkheart Records in 2011, lauded for its impressive fusion of Calypso, the music of Trinidad & Tobago and home to Victor's cultural roots, with free jazz. The legendary and longstanding Dutch outfit, the Instant Composer's Pool Orkest (ICP) led by Misha Mengelberg/Han Bennink invited Victor to tour with them in Europe in 2010 and appear during US tours in 2011, 2014 and 2015. Victor is the first vocalist to work consistently with ICP in it's 50 year history. Victor was one of the vocalists on Trillium E (New Braxton Records 2011) with Anthony Braxton's Tri-Centric Orchestra and Trillium J during the four-day Braxtonian Festival in 2011. Reedist Ab Baars invited Victor and french horn hero Vincent Chancey to celebrate 20 years with his esteemed trio in 2011 including a 15-concert European tour, the first time Baars had written material for voice and specifically for Victor; that work is contained on The Invisible Blow (Stichting Wig 2014). Victor received a presenting commission from Anthony Braxton himself on behalf of the Tricentric Foundation for Neighborhood Dynamics (co-composed with Jochem van Dijk) that was presented during the TriCentric Festival in a double bill with Anthony Braxton's Nonet in 2014. Neighborhood Dynamics is a piece about gentrification and the changing demographic landscape of Brooklyn, NY, where Victor calls home. Over the past four years, Victor's work with esteemed avant-garde trombonist Roswell Rudd has seen a deeper connection appearing on his 2014 Trombone for Lovers(Sunnyside Records 2014) and now appearing on every track of Embrace (RareNoise 2017), a project of re-imagined standards. Victor was part of a voice/percussion/piano duo with MacArthur genius grant recipient, professor and composer/multi-instrumentalist Tyshawn Sorey, with appearances at Constellation in Chicago, IL (2016) and Vision Festival XVVI (2014) amongst their performance highlights.

Victor is also out on record as a part of Glorious Ravage, a sprawling song-cycle in honor of Victorian-era female explorers composed by Bay Area bassist/composer Lisa Mezzacappa (New World Records 2017). Mezzacappa and Victor have collaborated frequently since 2011 and the song cycle was originally inspired by Victor's first trip out West to play with Mezzacappa. Finally, Victor is part of ReDDeer a trio of improvisors that met at MusicOmi in 2010 with a record of live duo/trio recordings in New York & Austria called New York - St. Johann (Evil Rabbit Records 2017) and Victor is a featured guest on Marc Ribot's Songs of Resistance, due for release in January 2018. Victor was just awarded a residency at Yaddo Corp. for Music Composition, staying there for 6 weeks to complete a large work on the life and death of her mother, in early 2018.

Victor performances has included such luminaries as Wadada Leo Smith, Marshall Allen (Sun Ra), NEA Jazz Master Dr. Randy Weston, NEA Jazz Master Archie Shepp, Roswell Rudd, Nicole Mitchell, William Parker, Myra Melford, Lawrence Butch Morris, Gary Lucas, Dave Burrell, Henry Threadgill, Andrew Cyrille, Jason Moran, Sam Newsome, Darius Jones, Anthony Coleman, Aruan Ortiz, Joe Morris, Vijay Iyer, Matana Roberts, Mark Dresser, Steven Bernstein, Marika Hughes, Mazz Swift, Marty Ehrlich, Melvin Gibbs, Henry Butler, Curtis Clark and the Duke Ellington Orchestra.

Victor has graced stages around the world including BAMCafe Live, The Stone (NY), Symphony Space (NY),The Jazz Standard (NY), Jazz at Lincoln Center (NY), National Sawdust (NY), Firehouse 12 (New Haven), The Bimhuis (The Netherlands), Cankarjev Dom (Slovenia), Koln Philharmonie (Germany), Nardis(Turkey), Rostov Philharmonic Hall (Russia), De Loft (Koln), The 55 Bar (monthly residency for over 5 years - NY), Vision Festival XV, XVI, XVIV, XXI, The ArtActs Festival (Austria), New Frequencies Festival (San Francisco) and River to River Festivals (New York)."