""Tassignon's singing is quite versatile ... she exhibits horn-like melodic and rhythmic dexterity, while at other times her voice wanders through a labyrinthine maze of amorphous syllabic abstractions."

This individuality, described here by Wilbur MacKenzie of All About Jazz, is what gives Belgian, Berlin-based vocalist Sophie Tassignon such a unique place in the world of modern jazz and creative music.

Over the past 20 years Sophie Tassignon has been composing and performing music with various projects ranging from jazz and avant-garde to electroacoustic music. She has released 10 CDs on a variety of record labels, including Clean Feed Records, A-jazz, Alone Blue Records, visionofsound, RareNoise and Jazzwerkstatt.

Her debut album Moon Talk, released in 2006 on Alone Blue Records, featuring her group ZOSHIA and eleven of her own compositions, was funded by the cultural department of the French Community of Belgium.

Sophie's second CD Hufflignon, a collaborative project with Canadian saxophonist Peter Van Huffel, and with New York bassist Michael Bates and Swiss trombonist Samuel Blaser, was released in 2008 on the renowned Portuguese label, Clean Feed Records - hailed by All About Jazz NY as one of the five most important jazz labels today. Hufflignon received critical acclaim by such publications as France's Jazz Magazine in which the CD was listed as a CD d'émoi - one of their most prestigious monthly mentions.

Additionally, and in follow-up to the success of Hufflignon, Sophie and Peter Van Huffel formed a group consisting of musicians who have relocated to Berlin. British pianist Julie Sassoon and Canadian bassist Miles Perkin complete the new formation called HOUSE OF MIRRORS which recorded a full set of new music for their second collaborative recording, released on Jan. 31st, 2014 on Wismart records.

In 2009 Tassignon formed the electroacoustic duo CHARLOTTE AND MR. STONE with British artist Simon Vincent. The project involved the creation of sonic textures and compositions within a live context, gave numerous performances across Europe, and released two recordings on the British label visionofsound. In 2014 the duo performed at the SYNC.14, the International Festival of Electroacoustic Music in Ekaterinburg, Russia, and in 2017 presented a 6-part - 5-hour performance at Copenhagen's Techfestival, examining the concept of 'binary' and the unrealised emancipatory potential of technology.

Since 2011 Sophie Tassignon has been developing a solo-vocal project, centred around through-composed works offering the potential for improvisation within given structures. In 2017 Tassignon was invited to give an experimental electroacoustic solo performance at the opening of an exhibit by German visual artist Margareta Hesse at the communal gallery 'Historischer Keller' in Berlin. The performance involved the experimentation of the influence of sonic textures within an environment intended to limit the visual scope of the public, with the only visible feature being red lasers projected throughout a number of rooms. In 2015 Sophie Tassignon was invited to the Visby International Centre for Composers (VICC) in Sweden to develop new material for her debut solo album, Mysteries Unfold, which was released on in May 2020 on London's Label RareNoise Records and was highly received by the press.

Tassignon has also created music for and performed in a number of modern theatre productions by Polish director Elzbieta Bednarska, including Taghaus/Nachthaus 2009 (author: Olga Tokarczuk), Schneeweiß und Russenrot 2010 (author: Dorota Maslowska), Nacht 2011 (author: Andrzej Stasiuk), Stimmen Aus Tschernobyl 2017, 2018 (author: Svetlana Alexiejevich), Die Mauern Von Hebron 2018 (author: Andrzej Stasiuk), Unrast 2019 (author: Dorota Maslowska) in which Sophie's electroacoustic voice techniques are also highly exhibited. She is currently composing new material for Bednarska's next production based on the socialist era in the USSR depicted by authors as Svetlana Alexievich.

Since 2009, she has co-led the musical quartet AZOLIA with Songwriter/Saxophonist Susanne Folk. The group has released three CDs to date, given performances at numerous venues and festivals across Europe, and has toured twice through China under invitation of the German General Consulate of Chengdu with additional support from Initiative Musik. Their their third album Not About Heroes, which was generously supported by the Berlin Senate Administration for Culture and Europe, involves the works of British poet Wilfred Owen who died at the end of WW1. Tassignon and Folk composed music to ten poems by Wilfred Owen, which speak of the atrocities of war and its pointlessness. The album was released on January 30th, 2021 on Berlin Label Jazzwerkstatt.

Tassignon began her musical studies with classical piano at the age of four and furthered her musical development with percussion and singing. She graduated with a Master's Degree in Music from the Royal Conservatory in Brussels and participated in numerous workshops and masterclasses with renowned musicians such as David Linx, Sheila Jordan, Fee Claassen, and Tony Malaby amongst many others. In 2006 she participated in a three-week workshop in 'Jazz & Creative Music' at the Banff Centre for the Arts in Alberta, Canada under the direction of trumpeter/composer Dave Douglas.

Sophie Tassignon currently resides in Berlin, Germany where she works as a full time musician, composer and classical piano instructor."

"A prolific saxophonist, clarinetist and composer, Peter Van Huffel appears frequently in all sorts of ensembles and musical settings with musicians from around the world. He is the leader of the punk-jazz trio GORILLA MASK, (with bassist Roland Fidezius and drummer Rudi Fischerlehner), which has been active since 2009 and has performed at some of the most recognized venues across Europe and toured across Canada in 2013. They released their debut CD, "HOWL!", in 2012 on the German label "Between the Lines Records", and their second album, "Bite My Blues", in 2014 on the acclaimed Portuguese avant-garde label "Clean Feed Records" - both of which received rave reviews across Europe, North America and Japan, as well as much attention in radio and print media around the world.

Peter has also worked as the co-leader of two ensembles with Belgian vocalist Sophie Tassignon: the Berlin based ensemble House of Mirrors - a chamber style group featuring pianist Julie Sassoon and bassist Meinrad Kneer, which can be heard on their 2014 release "Act One" (featuring the group's original bassist, Miles Perkin); and HuffLiGNoN with bassist Michael Bates and trombonist Samuel Blaser, which released it's debut album on "Clean Feed Records" in 2008 to outstanding reviews including a Disque d'Émoi from France's Jazz Magazine - one of the magazine's top monthly mentions. The music of House of Mirrors covers an eclectic array of spectrums, including influences from 20th century composers, exploratory improvisations and lyrical songs. HuffLiGNoN, also chamber-esque but with heavier jazz influences, held performances in New York, Canada, and completed three extensive tours of Europe in 2008 and 2009.

In 2009, Peter developed an international quartet featuring musicians from all over the globe who came together in Berlin and Cologne to record Peter's second disc for Fresh Sound Records, "Like the Rusted Key". In 2010, this international quartet, (featuring New York pianist Jesse Stacken, bassist Miles Perkin, and Swiss drummer Samuel Rohrer), followed the release of their critically acclaimed CD with a series of four tours across Europe and a cross-Canada tour which included performances at some of Canada's top jazz festivals. Previously, Peter led the New York based PVH Quintet with Jesse Stacken, Scott DuBois, Michael Bates and Jeff Davis during his 2002-08 NYC residency. The group held regular performances at such New York staples as the 55 Bar, The Tea Lounge and the Cornelia Street Café, and toured Canada frequently. They can be heard on Peter's 2007 Fresh Sound Records release, "Silvester Battlefield" and on their 2005 independent release "On Common Ground".

Aside from GORILLA MASK, Peter is currently active with a slew of other projects including the Berlin duo KRONIX with Canadian-Ukrainian guitarist Alex Maksymiw - which released their debut CD on Fresh Sound records in early 2016; the New-York based trio BOOM CRANE, featuring Michael Bates (bass) and Jeff Davis (drums) which released its debut CD in 2014 (also on Fresh Sound/New Talent); and the Berlin based collaborative trio The Scrambling EX with legendary German musicians Andreas Willers and Oliver Steidle, which released it's debut album on England's FMR records in 2015. In addition, Peter also performs as a part of the Meinrad Kneer Quintet, the Scott Fields Freetet, and frequently with American guitarist Dan Nettles.

Aside from Peter's extensive discography as a bandleader, he can be heard on the 2006 release by the New York trio ANIMAL FORUM; two discs by NYC based guitarist Lily Maase; a re-scored DVD/CD release of the Buster Keaton film "Steamboat Bill Jr." by guitarist Dan Nettles as well as Dan's recent vinyl releases "Inside Voices" and "Outside Choices" (2015) with his regular ensemble Kenosha Kid; the 2014 release GrunGrauBraun on Gligg Records by the German ensemble HUM; and his debut CD from 2003, "Mind Over Matter" featuring his early Toronto-based ensemble. Peter also performs frequently with a number of other musicians from Europe, North America and beyond in variety of improvised and original-music settings."

"[...] Born and raised in La Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland - a lesser-known but no less significant jazz metropolis which was, for a time, home to expatriate Americans Sidney Bechet and Kenny Clarke, as well as Swiss jazz trombonist Raymond Droz - Blaser has also spent considerable time living in New York City and currently resides in Berlin; truly an international musician, then, in clear defiance of boundaries cultural, musical and stylistic. Beginning trombone lessons at the age of 9, he "couldn't go past third position and had to have a trolley to carry trombone because it was too heavy," says Blaser. Still, with plenty of music in the Blaser household, where he was the middle of three children - ranging from Swiss folk music to American R&B and jazz - Blaser progressed quickly, entering the local conservatory at 14 and graduating seven years later in 2002 after receiving a number of awards in both the jazz and classical spheres, including the 2000 Benny Golson Prize.

Continuing private studies, Blaser began a number of significant associations, including the heralded Vienna Art Orchestra and European Radio Big Band, leading to a Fulbright scholarship which enabled him to study in the United States at the Purchase College Conservatory of Music, going on to win the J.J. Johnson Prize, as well as both the Public Prize and Jury's Favorite Player awards at the 2006 Fribourg Jazz Festival.

All of these diverse accomplishments have ultimately - and inevitably - led to Blaser finding a personal nexus where disparate elements like Indian Tihi and Wagnerian opera meet. Blaser's impressive improvisational élan is predicated on instrumental mastery that is nothing more than the means to very musical ends. Together with his equally unfettered quartet, Blaser continues to expand the purview of jazz, redefining it in the new millennium as it enters its second century of existence.

Beyond Blaser's ability to combine knotty compositional form with incendiary improvisational prowess in the context of his own music, his unfettered yet ever-collaborative approach has resulted in a number of significant associations, among them his ongoing work with Swiss percussion legend Pierre Favre; a much-lauded duo with pianist Malcolm Braff; touring in 2012 as a member of François Houle's recent 5+1 group, and heard on the French Canadian clarinetist's Genera (Songlines, 2012); and recording/performing with Berlin-based Canadian saxophonist Peter van Huffel's HuffLiGNoN group with singer Sophie Tassignon. Blaser has also shared the stage with artists including trombonist David Taylor, bassist Michael Blake, drummer John Hollenbeck and pianist Hal Galper. It's no surprise that Rene Laanen of USA Trombone Online has called Blaser" one of today´s finest trombonists."

2013 will see Blaser touring with two new trios: one that, in addition to Marc Ducret, will also feature Danish drummer Peter Bruun; and another featuring French pianist Benoit Delbecq and American drummer Gerry Hemingway. Equally important, Blaser will also reunite his Consort in Motion (Kind of Blue, 2011) Quartet with pianist Russ Lossing, Belgian reed player Joachim Badenhorst, bassist Drew Gress and Hemingway, who replaces the sadly deceased Paul Motian. That record - Blaser's first and only to include a pianist, marrying the seemingly disparate elements of Renaissance and Baroque period composition with more open-ended jazz improvisation - was praised by All About Jazz's Troy Collins as " Fearlessly modern, yet respectfully regal." Collins continues, asserting that "Blaser's adventurous arrangements and reinterpretations offer the best of both worlds, enriching the raw impetuousness of avant-garde jazz with the proven sophistication of ageless classical forms. Consort in Motion is a high-water mark in the enduring lineage of the Third Stream, and all the more inspiring for the focus of its vision."

Meanwhile, with the release of As the Sea - like Boundless, a live recording but one culled from a single performance - Blaser reaps the rewards of greater trust and personal camaraderie built with Ducret, Oester and Cleaver through additional touring, following the release of their debut recording. "The music is quite different from the first record," says Blaser, "because things are more written. It's a little more complex rhythmically, too. But it's crazy, because I can play anything - a single note, even - and everybody will move with me. It's pretty intense."

Between recording and touring with his own groups and collaborating in other leaders' ensembles, Blaser's career continues an upward trajectory that seems to have no end in sight. "The world of music fascinates me to no end, and I´m determined to take one journey after another with my instrument and work," says Blaser. "It´s all about discovery and communicating new ideas. Believe me, I´m proof that a shiny trombone can send a message right to your heart and change your life." "

"[...] Michael Bates grew up in Canada and often worked at the Vancouver International Jazz Festival. He began playing music in hardcore and punk rock bands and maintains that being a jazz musician is no different. While the music he writes and performs is rooted in the jazz, classical and creative music traditions, hardcore's 'Do It Yourself' ethos remains an important component of his music. He is well known as a hard worker and motivated performer.

Michael has recorded as a leader and as a sideman. He has composed well over two hundred pieces of music including works for chamber ensembles, string quartets and solo double bass. As a touring artist, he has visited Europe, Asia, the United States and Canada. Michael has received several grants and fellowships from the Canada Council of the Arts and was on faculty for five years at the Banff International Jazz Workshop. He has studied with the former principal bassist of the Tokyo Symphony, Yoshio Nagashima, at the University of Toronto with Don Thompson and Dave Young and in New York with bassist/composer Mark Helias and Tony Falanga. [...]"