Cassandra Wilson
Cassandra Wilson (born 4th December 1955) is a U.S. jazz vocalist and two-time Grammy Award winner from Jackson, Mississippi. Two of her albums, Blue Skies (1988) and New Moon Daughter (1996), have topped the US jazz charts, and the latter also won her a Grammy for Best Jazz Vocal Performance in 1997. More recently, Wilson's latest album Loverly (2008) also won the Grammy for Best Jazz Vocal Album at the 51st Grammy Awards in 2009.
Mark Lockheart
Brandon Allen
Amy Dickson
Saxophonist Amy Dickson began lessons at the age of six and made her concerto debut ten years later. Recognized widely for her remarkable and distinctive tone and exceptional musicality, she has performed in Europe, Africa and Australasia, in venues such as the Wigmore Hall and the Sydney Opera House. She has also performed as a soloist with many orchestras throughout the world including the Sydney Symphony Orchestra and the Vienna Chamber Orchestra.
Derek Nash
Joe McPhee
Since his emergence on the creative jazz and new music scene in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s, Joe McPhee has been a deeply emotional composer, improviser, and multi-instrumentalist, as well as a thoughtful conceptualist and theoretician. Born on November 3, 1939, in Miami, FL, McPhee first began playing the trumpet at age eight. McPhee continued on that instrument through high school and then in a U.S.
Paul Dunmall
Paul Dunmall (born in Welling, London, UK) is a British jazz saxophonist who plays tenor saxophone and soprano saxophone as well as some more unusual instruments such as the Saxello and the Northumbrian Pipes. He has been a leading light on the international free improvisation scene for a great many years. Most of his prolific recorded output is available on the Duns Limited Edition label (see http://www.mindyourownmusic.co.uk/duns-lake.
Tony Kofi
The playing career of saxophonist Tony Kofi began when he chanced upon a series of jazz workshops, run in Leicester by Nick Hislam. Born in Nottingham to West African parents, Tony was bitten by the jazz bug and made a point of making the journey to go along to each session. This laid the seeds for what was to come, and a stint at the legendary Berklee College of Music in Boston Mass. USA, on a full scholarship. While in the US, Tony studied with such musical luminaries as Andy Magee, Ernie Watts and Billy Pierce, gaining invaluable experience that he then put to best use when back in the UK.
The Divetones
The founder members of The Divetones met in the dark and dank back-corridors of the Kingston University music department. They started plotting a retro-inspired instrumental frenzy, and just a short decade later, it came to be. On their journey they picked up a jazz-crazy trumpeter and a moustachioed bass player, and by the beginning of 2010 the combo was ready to enslave audiences with their sleazy groove.