"Tom Arthurs is a trumpeter and composer for the 21st century - drawing honestly and infinitely from a dizzying range of influences. His music-making represents a rare beauty and creative depth, and he cites inspiration from John Taylor, Kenny Wheeler and Jimmy Guiffre, African and South American traditional music, Berlin's Echtzeitmusik scene, as well as György Ligeti, Luc Ferrari and Morton Feldman. Aside from music, Tarkovsky, Godard, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Lau Tzu and Farid Ud-Din Attar remain deeply influential, as do much-cherished experiences of baroque music, the pygmies of Central Africa, Gal Costa, David Sylvian and Arto Lindsay.

Already by his mid-30s, news of Arthurs' finesse, glowing sound and relentless creativity has spread far and wide, with New York City Jazz Record's Thomas Conrad describing his playing as "continuously, beautifully unfamiliar", and allaboutjazz's John Kelman describing his improvisations as "simple but perfect", demonstrating "an exacting perfection" and with "a harmon-muted tone that renders his playing as vulnerable as Miles Davis at his fragile best".

Closer to home, Tom has been described as "a world-class improviser" by UK's Jazzwise, "une révélation" by France's Citizenjazz, and "der Glasbläser" (the glass-blower) by Germany's SWR2.

Tom is currently Artistic Director of the Jazz and Contemporary Music department at Bern University of the Arts, Switzerland, and his main project is the Tom Arthurs Trio, with Finnish drummer Markku Ounaskari and Berlin-based pianist Marc Schmolling. He is equally at home with enthrallingly touching solo performances, and a range of collective improvised projects - including GLUE, QUAIRÓS, Pedesis and duos with Isambard Khroustaliov and Simon Vincent. Arthurs has been awarded composition commissions from the BBC/RPS, City of London Festival, BBC Proms, the Elias Quartet and the BBC Concert Orchestra, and has worked with folk musicians including The Unthanks and James Yorkston, also contributing a sonic cameo to now-legendary BBC TV comedy The Mighty Boosh.

Tom has performed and recorded with Ingrid Laubrock, Dine Doneff (Kostas Theodorou), Denis Badault, Maciej Obara, Julia Hülsmann and Theo Bleckmann, and has shared the stage with an incredible range of musicians, including John Surman, John Taylor, Kenny Wheeler, Benoît Delbecq, Jack DeJohnette, Régis Huby, Joanna MacGregor, Iain Ballamy, Thomas Strønen, Ignaz Schick, Jan Bang, Nicolas Masson, Julie Sassoon, Tom Rainey, Drew Gress, Rudi Mahall, Eddie Prévost, Willi Kellers and Steve Beresford. Arthurs also plays regularly with the very finest of his own generation - including Marc Schmolling, Almut Kühne, Miles Perkin, Philipp Gropper, Ronny Graupe and Wanja Slavin.

Tom was one of the first BBC New Generation Artists for jazz (2008-10), a participant in Serious' career development schemes 'Take Five' and 'Take Five Europe', and has recorded for ECM, Ozella, Act, Intakt, Babel, Unit, Jazzwerkstatt, Creative Sources, Babel and Not Applicable. He has performed in festivals including Berlin, North Sea, Cheltenham, Moers, Victoriaville, Jonquieres, Bath, Jazzd'or (Berlin and Strasbourg), London, Jazz Jantar, Jazztopad and Jerusalem, and has been broadcast by the BBC, Radio France, SWR, WDR, RBB, ARD, P2 (Denmark) and Ö1 (Austria).

Tom holds a PhD from the University of Edinburgh (his work was an ethnographic approach to Berlin's Improvised Music scene) and he has given lessons, lectures and workshops at Jazz Institut Berlin, University of Oxford, Hochschulübergreifende Zentrum Tanz Berlin (HZT/UdK), Universität Potsdam and International Jazz Platform (Lodz)."

"Benoît Delbecq was born in St Germain en Laye (F), June 6, 1966. He lives in Bondy, near Paris. A dreamer and an adventurer in music, pianist/composer/producer Benoît Delbecq has been one of the activists of Hask (1992-2004) and Astrolab (1994-1999), two Paris-based cutting-edge jazz/improv collectives that have contributed to significantly revitalize the french creative music scene around the club Instants Chavirés in Montreuil/Paris. His music and projects include works for theater, dance, litterature, visual arts and motion pictures, that are being regularly invited by major festivals worldwide. He has released about 35 records as a leader or co-leader among a discography of more than a hundred discs.

Anchored in both jazz history as well as in aesthetical stakes of today's new musics, Delbecq's works are world-widely acclaimed since the early nineties. He is a renown specialist for a personal and polymetric approach of "prepared piano", and has also an regular activity in the electronic department. His works are experimenting a blend of improvisation and composition in which he reveals a rich pallet of sounds, enlightened by stratas of multiple momentums, articulations and seemingly floating harmonies. Inspired by alternative urban musical experiments and electronic music adventures, he also improvises a personal approach of drum'n bass and ambient.

Benoît was awarded 'Prix jeunes affiches de la SACEM' in 1995 with group KARTET, prix de la Villa Médicis Hors-les-murs 2001 for his first solo piano recording " Nu-Turn " (Songlines, 2003), was awarded with the fellowship of Civitella Fundation (New York, 2009), was awarded in 2010 a double Grand Prix International du Disque (Académie Charles Cros, the French Grammy Awards), and his trio CD "The Sixth Jump " (Songlines) was listed in the New York Times top ten jazz/pop records of 2010. His works for the Fred Hersch/Benoît Delbecq FUN HOUSE double trio (premiered and recorded in May 2012, to be released FEB 2013) have recently received the French Ministère de la Culture " Commande d'Etat " funding. Recently he was commissioned by JAZZTOPAD Festival in Wroclaw (Poland) for a new piece for the Lutoslawski String Quartet and two improvisers (Miles Perkin on bass and himself on piano)."

Jim Black is at the forefront of a new generation of musicians bringing jazz into the 21st century. In addition to being one of the most influential drummers of our time, he is also the leader of one of the world's most forward-thinking bands, AlasNoAxis, featuring his longtime collaborators Chris Speed, Hilmar Jensson and Skúli Sverrisson. Based on the foundation of his virtuosic but highly personal approach to jazz drumming, Black's aesthetic has expanded to include Balkan rhythms, rock songcraft and laptop soundscapes. Though he is revered worldwide for his limitless technique and futuristic concepts, what many listeners treasure in most Jim Black's work is the relentless feeling of joy and invention he brings to his performances. Jim Black's smiling, kinetic, unpredictable presence has enthralled and inspired audiences worldwide for over twenty-five years.

Since the mid-90's, Black has played a major role in the incorporation of new sounds and techniques into the jazz/creative music context. As a member of the collective group Pachora (with Speed, Sverrisson, and guitarist Brad Shepik) Black was one of the leaders in the study and adaptation of Balkan music into jazz-based music. His advanced techniques abstracted the odd time signatures of the Balkans into a new polyrhythmic language equally informed by modern jazz, drum&bass and the dumbeks of the Balkans. Black has also been an innovator in the use of electronics in improvisation, bridging the gap between electro-acoustic improv and more jazz-based traditions. Today, Black's performances are just as likely to feature his laptop-based electronic textures as his drumming.

Born in 1967, Jim Black grew up in Seattle alongside future colleagues Chris Speed, Andrew D'Angelo and Cuong Vu. After cementing their personal and artistic relationships in Seattle's various youth jazz ensembles, in 1985 they moved to Boston, where Black entered the Berklee School of Music. In Boston, Black, Speed and D'Angelo formed Human Feel with guitarist Kurt Rosenwinkel, which rapidly attracted the attention of the jazz cognoscenti in Boston, New York and beyond.

By 1991, Black and the other members of Human Feel had moved to New York City, where they electrified the Downtown music scene then centered around the Knitting Factory and rapidly became among the city's busiest sidemen. Black's early years in New York saw him take featured roles in some of the most critically acclaimed bands of the time, like Tim Berne's Bloodcount, Ellery Eskelin's trio, and Dave Douglas's Tiny Bell Trio. Thus began fifteen years of near-constant touring and recording, with the above bands as well as artists like Uri Caine, Dave Liebman, Nels Cline, Steve Coleman, Tomasz Stanko, and Laurie Anderson.

"Miles Perkin (b. 1980) A unique voice on the Double Bass, his captivating solo sets juxtapose his clear singing voice against the wild overtones and deep resonances projecting from his bass. He uses a unique combination of conventional, extended and invented techniques along with unconventional tools and re-amping to extract a vast palate of sounds from his bass. Following up on his 2019 quartet release ::The Point In Question:: on Clean Feed Records with Tom Arthurs, Benoit Delbecq and Jim Black, his recently completed solo album ::Subtones:: was released in 2020.

Based in Berlin since 2010, he is an active collaborator on the international music scene, working with musicians such as Michael Attias, Kris Davis, Benoit Delbecq, Johanna Borchert, Simon Jermyn, Jim Black, Jacobien Vlasman, Achim Kaufmann, Craig Taborn, Tobias Delius, Ralph Alessi, Eve Risser, Maciej Obara, Yorgos Dimitriadis, Markus Pesonen, Magda Mayas, Samuel Rohrer, Peter Van Huffel, Kim Myhr and many others. He is also a music maker for Theatre productions in Germany, composing and performing his works live on stage at major theatres such as: Deutsches Theater Berlin, Staatstheater Stuttgart, Theater Bremen, Kammerspiele Munich, Maxim Gorki Theater Berlin, Schaubühne Berlin, and Staatstheater Dresden. [...]"