"Scott Fields (born September 30, 1952 in Chicago, Illinois) is a guitarist, composer, and bandleader. He is best known for his attempts to blend music that is composed and music that is written and for his modular pieces (see 48 Motives, 96 Gestures and "OZZO"). He works primarily in avant-garde jazz, experimental music, and contemporary classical music.

Fields was born and raised in Chicago, Illinois. He started as a self-taught rock musician but soon was influenced by the musicians of the Association for the Advancement for Creative Musicians (AACM), which was active in the Hyde Park neighborhood in which he grew up. Later he studied classical guitar, jazz guitar, music composition, and music theory. In 1973 Fields co-founded the avant-garde jazz trio Life Rhythms. When the group disbanded two years later, he played sporadically but soon was institutionalized for an extended period. He almost quit music until 1989.

Since then he has performed and composed actively. His ensembles and partnerships have included such musicians as Marilyn Crispell, Hamid Drake, John Hollenbeck, Joseph Jarman, Myra Melford, Jeff Parker, and Elliott Sharp."

"John Hollenbeck is a composer of music uncategorizable beyond the fact of being always identifiably his. A conceptualist able to translate the traditions of jazz and new music into a fresh, eclectic, forward-looking language of his own invention, intellectually rewarding yet ever accessibly vibrant. A drummer and percussionist possessed of a playful versatility and a virtuosic wit. Most of all, a musical thinker - whether putting pen to paper or conjuring spontaneous sound - allergic to repetition, forever seeking to surprise himself and his audiences. [...]

Hollenbeck received degrees in percussion and jazz composition from the Eastman School of Music before moving to New York City in the early 1990s. He was profoundly shaped by the mentorship of two hugely influential artists: trombonist/arranger/composer Bob Brookmeyer and composer/choreographer Meredith Monk. His relationship with Brookmeyer reached back to the age of 14, when he attended the SUNY Binghamton Summer Jazz Workshop, and continued at Eastman, through NEA-funded composition study, and finally on the bandstand with Brookmeyer's New Art Orchestra and in the studio with Brookmeyer and trumpet great Kenny Wheeler. For Monk, Hollenbeck composed and performed the percussion scores for five of her works: "Magic Frequencies," "Mercy," "The Impermanence Project," "Songs of Ascension" and "On Behalf of Nature."

Hollenbeck's awards and honors include four Grammy nominations; the 2012 Doris Duke Performing Artist Award, the 2010 ASCAP Jazz Vanguard Award and a 2007 Guggenheim Fellowship; winning the Jazz Composers Alliance Composition Contest in 1995 and 2002; Meet the Composer's Grants in 1995 and 2001; and a Rising Star Arranger win in the 2012 and 2013 DownBeat Critics' Polls as well as in 2011 for the JHLE as Rising Star Big Band. John was a professor of Jazz Drums and Improvisation at the Jazz Institute Berlin from 2005-2016 and in 2015 joined the faculty of McGill University's Schulich School of Music."

"Born in 1959 in Amarillo, Texas (USA). University music studies 1976-1981 in Texas (Univ. of Texas/Austin, 76-79, North Texas State/Denton, 80-81) and in Paris, France 79-80). 1980-83 active with the free improvisation quartet BL Lacerta as Artist-in-Residence in Dallas with support from the Texas Commission on the Arts, Chamber Music America, the Atlantic-Richfield Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts (his "Masters in Improvisation"). The collaboration with artists of widely divergent media forms has ever since been a significant aspect of his activities as a cellist, teacher, improviser and composer for over 30 years.

German resident since 1983 in Stuttgart und Essen. Further composition studies, teacher in a "youth music school" in Gladbeck 1985-1988. 1987-89 full-time cellist in the Dortmund Philharmonic, on a project basis until 1998. In the 1990s, active with the Wolpe Trio (Essen), Musikfabrik NRW (Düsseldorf), ensemble avance (Stuttgart), the trombonist/ composer Mike Svoboda, the organist/composer Gary Verkade (and their improvisation ensemble Synthese), extensive private cello teaching and the beginning of school projects in contemporary music and group improvisation (especially in the "Response" program in the Frankfurt area until 2004 and thereafter in Essen). Worked with dancers Dyane Neiman and Robert Solomon.

From about 2000, active in Ensemble >gelberklang< and Helios String Quartet (both in Stuttgart), in the ensembles of Mike Svoboda and the American composer/guitarist Scott Fields (Cologne), concerts and film music with Michael Riessler, several collaborations with the French dancer-choreographer Christine Brunel in Essen and the Polish painter Agata Schubert. Guest with Ensemble Modern Orchestra (Frankfurt), ensemble recherche (Freiburg) and willing collaborator in many improvisation- and composition-based projects of all kinds.

Starting in 2010 with his move back to Stuttgart, increased emphasis on composition and solo work with cello/electronics, collaborations as musician/actor with the choreographer Nina Kurzeja ("Tattoo") and TART Produktions ("Napoleon Raskolnikow im Schnee"), both in Stuttgart. In 2011 he began a very fruitful collaboration with the spoken-word poet Timo Brunke leading to "Der Übergang des Abendlandes", commissioned and produced by the Theaterhaus Stuttgart. In 2012 he played in a trio project with the South African jazz pianist Abdullah Ibrahim and Cleave Guyton (woodwinds, NY). Release of Blind Date Quartet CD with A. Sheridan (flutes), U. Stortz (violin), SR (cello) and J. Hollenbeck (drums/percussion).

Represented as a cellist, improviser and composer on labels such as Wergo (Frankfurt), cybele (Dusseldorf), Kairos (Vienna), free elephant records (Wuppertal), New World Records (New York), clean feed (Lisbon) und GPE records/Timezone.

In 2005, co-founded Open_Music e.V. (Stuttgart), a non-profit organization for improvisation and artistic education which has been awarded numerous grants and prizes from national, state and local agencies and foundations. Open_Music, which has carried out more than 70 projects in the past 7 years with children, youth and young adults from a wide spectrum of social backgrounds, was part of the so-called Southern Network, an initiative of the National Cultural Foundation for innovative performance and education projects in the Stuttgart region from 2008-2011. As of 2012, Open_Music has been granted institutional funding by the City of Stuttgart in addition to significant funding from state resources and private foundations."

"Matthias Schubert (born April 18, 1960 in Kassel ) is a German jazz musician (tenor saxophone, oboe and composition).

Schubert had oboe lessons as a teenager. The saxophonists Allan Praskin and Melvin Phillips introduced him to jazz. He studied from 1979 to 1983 at the University of Music and Performing Arts Hamburg with Andy Scherrer, Herb Geller and Walter Norris. He played for a long time in the Euro Jazz Band, the Graham Collier Band and the Marty Cook Group, but also with the groups of Albert Mangelsdorff, Manfred Bründl and others.

He played in the quartet with Simon Nabatov, Lindsey Horner and Tom Rainey during the 1990s. He forms a trio with Carl Ludwig Hübsch and Wolter Wierbos. He has founded the James Choice Orchestra with Hübsch, Frank Gratkowski and Norbert Stein. He also played with Karl Berger, Klaus King, Kathrin Lemke, Jeanne Lee, Joachim Ullrich, Andreas Willers, Xu Fengxia, Scott Fields, Uwe Oberg,Uli Böttcher and Alois Kott. In 2001 he was appointed as a lecturer at the University of Music, Drama and Media Hanover."