"A seemingly endless -- and endlessly eclectic -- series of releases made the innovative guitarist Eugene Chadbourne one of the underground community's most well-known and well-regarded eccentrics. Born January 4, 1954 in Mount Vernon, NY, Chadbourne was raised in Boulder, CO, by his mother, a refugee of the Nazi death camps. At the age of 11, the Beatles inspired him to learn guitar; later exposure to Jimi Hendrix prompted him to begin experimenting with distortion pedals and fuzzboxes. Ultimately, however, he became dissatisfied with the conventions of rock and pop, and traded in his electric guitar for an acoustic one, on which he began to learn to play bottleneck blues.

Perhaps Chadbourne's most significant formative discovery was jazz; initially drawn to John Coltrane and Roland Kirk, he later became an acolyte of the avant excursions of Derek Bailey and Anthony Braxton. Despite the huge influence music exerted over his life, however, Chadbourne first studied to become a journalist, but his career was derailed when he fled to Canada rather than fight in Vietnam; only President Jimmy Carter's declaration of amnesty for conscientious objectors allowed the vociferously left-wing Chadbourne to return to the U.S. in 1976, at which time he plunged headlong into the New York downtown music scene. After releasing his 1976 debut, Solo Acoustic Guitar, he began collaborating on purely improvisational music with the visionary saxophonist John Zorn and the acclaimed guitarist Henry Kaiser.

Quickly, Chadbourne carved out a singular style, comprised of equal parts protest music, free improvisation, and avant-garde jazz, topped off with his absurd, squeaky vocals. A complete list of Chadbourne's countless subsequent collaborations and genre workouts is far too lengthy and detailed to exhaustively document, although in the early '80s he garnered some of his first significant attention as the frontman of Shockabilly, a demented rockabilly revisionist outfit which also featured the well-known producer Kramer. Following the group's breakup, Chadbourne turned to his own idiosyncratic brand of country and folk, accurately dubbed LSD C&W on a 1987 release, the same year he joined the members of Camper Van Beethoven for a one-off covers project. In addition, he recorded with artists ranging from Fred Frith and Elliott Sharp to Evan Johns and Jimmy Carl Black, the original drummer in the Mothers of Invention; in between, he continued exploring unique styles inspired by music from the four corners of the globe, all the while issuing a seemingly innumerable string of records, most of them on his own Parachute label."

"Marianne Schroeder (born 1949) is a Swiss pianist and composer. She studied with Giacinto Scelsi. She played at Carnegie Hall, Lucerne Festival and Théâtre des Champs-Élysées. She worked with John Cage and Shigeru Kan-no.

She is a member of the Groupe Lacroix and as such is specialized in contemporary classical music. As a member of the Groupe Lacroix she has worked with international musicians, such as the Ensemble Sortisatio."

", born and raised in Munich, Germany has been a professional freelance musician for more than 25 years. He has played in many European countries such as France, England, Spain, Italy, Czech Republic, Austria and fused into the vivid music scenes of Vienna as well as Hamburg and Berlin, worked with German Krautrock pioneers Embryo and members of Amon Düül, immersed himself in the Swing Jazz of great gipsy musicians everpresent in his country and has spent months in Texas, USA, playing with a wide range of local musicians. He has developed his own style of Jazz oriented, Blues based music, reworking influences of Country, Tex-Mex and Ska. Titus Waldenfels plays guitar, violin, banjo and steel guitar, sometimes providing his own rythym by playing a one-string bass guitar with his feet simultaneously."

"Steven De Bruyn: Former of the popular experimental blues band "El Fish" and more recently a new collective, "The Rhythm Junks". A tight band with a very distinctive sound. A sultry groove of alienated swing, ranging from 'mad camel' blues to fat funk; the whole thing strongly spiced up with harmonica and persuasively blown out by a horn quartet with major lungcapacity. He's got a great acoustic sound but his trademark is probably his distinctive electric tone and clever use of electronic effects."

"Gary Cherwonka has been teaching over 20 years of private and group instruction/lessons at many different music schools in Alberta and British Columbia. He plays and teaches a great variety of instruments, from steel guitar, guitar, banjo, dobro, bass guitar, to ukulele. He has studied with the best musicians in their fields - Steel guitar with Leon McAuliffe, Mike Cass Jeff Newman, and Buddy Emmons, guitar with Eldon Shamblin and Pat Donahue and Dobro with Jerry Douglas. Gary is also trained in piano tuning and repairs at Rogers State College and has been tuning pianos for many for local schools. He is also a skilled sound engineer/sound technician, running concerts for Buddy Rich, Tommy Dorsey Orchestra, Da Falla Guitar Trio, Nevada Dance Company, Hank Thompson, Leon MacAuliffe, KXON-TV, Rogers State College recording studio, Dukes of Dixieland, etc. Gary holds an Associate of Arts Degree in Country Music - Rogers State College - Claremore, Oklahoma and also a Diploma in Recording Production from the Grant MacEwan College Edmonton AB - Jazz Program. As a performer, he has played with the Tulsa Philharmonic, Leon McAuliffe, Hank Thompson, The Telluride, Bluegrass Symphony Showdown, Laura Vinson and numerous other acts. Gary also performed on the weekly television show "Oklahoma Swingin' Country as a featured performer as well as being a member of the house band, appeared on Nashville Network Television and was included in a feature article in "Bluegrass Unlimited" magazine."