Roscoe Mitchell
born 1940 in Chicago, has been a restless explorer of forms, ideas and concepts for more than 50 years and, as player, composer and thinker, has been an inspiration for successive generations of musicians. In 1966 his album Sound brought a new dynamic into improvised music with emphases on texture and silences and group creativity and set some directions for the shape of new jazz to come - directions further crystallized in the pioneering work of the Art Ensemble of Chicago, whose ECM albums include Nice Guys, Full Force, Urban Bushmen, and Tribute to Lester. In 2004, Roscoe Mitchell co-led the Transatlantic Art Ensemble with Evan Parker (albums: Composition/ Improvisation Nos. 1, 2 and 3 and Boustrophedon). Recordings with Mitchell’s Note Factory band on ECM are Nine To Get Ready and Far Side.

2017 has seen Roscoe Mitchell working across a characteristically broad range of idioms, beginning the year with a series of tributes to John Coltrane, followed by a London residency with the Art Ensemble, and premieres of new orchestral music with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra and the Orchestra Del Teatro Comunale Di Bologna. Activities in the coming months include solo performances and trio work.