Matt Mitchell's Central Chain

Central Chain represents Matt Mitchell's first venture into bandleading after several years of solo, collective, and sideman work. Drawing on his interests in music drawn from both jazz and non-jazz continuums, as well as an ensemble comprised of several current major composers and improvisors in the New York scene, he seeks to compose music that challenges and inspires himself, his bandmates, and the audience. Joining Matt as members of Central Chain are Tim Berne (Bloodcount, Hard Cell, Big Satan), Oscar Noriega (Tim Berne's Los Totopos, Benefit Band, Gerry Hemingway), Mary Halvorson (Mary Halvorson Trio, Anthony Braxton, Taylor Ho Bynum), John Hebert (Byzantine Monkey, Andrew Hill, Fred Hersch), and Tomas Fujiwara (The Hook Up, Taylor Ho Bynum, Matana Roberts). This will be the debut performance for this band, featuring a brand new large scale six-part composition written specifically for the band.

Matt Mitchell is a pianist and composer interested in the intersections of various strains of acoustic, electric, composed, and improvised new music. He has lived in Philadelphia since 1999 and performs regularly in New York City and throughout the United States and Europe. He is a member of Tim Berne's ensembles Los Totopos and Adobe Probe. He also performs with Brad Shepik's Human Activity Quintet, John Hollenbeck's Claudia Quintet, Tom Rainey, Ingrid Laubrock, Ralph Alessi, Andrew D'Angelo, a collective trio with Doug Hirlinger and Tarus Mateen, and an electronic duo with Aaron Meicht called Brown Grant. He is a former member of the long-standing Philadelphia improvising groups Kaktus and Feigner and of the Denver-based avant rock group Thinking Plague. He has released several albums on Scrapple Records and is also a faculty member with the Brooklyn-based School for Improvisational Music [SIM].