The Chicago Edge Ensemble features the compositions of Dan Phillips and the highly interactive and dynamic collective ensemble improvisations of Avreeayl Ra, Jeb Bishop, Josh Berman, and Krzysztof Pabian. They are performing in support of their fourth release as an ensemble! Freedom, structure, collectivism and melodicism combine to make this their most exciting work yet and a highly unique offering to the world of jazz and improvised music from musicians who have deep roots in the language.
The quintet will perform two sets at 8:30 and 9:30 pm.
$15 / $10 w/ Student ID - Tickets Available at the Door
About The Artists
Dan Phillips (guitar) is the leader of Quartet Next, Dan Phillips Trio, and Dan Phillips Quartet. Dan has performed with jazz musicians such as Hamid Drake, Gerald Wilson, Danilo Pérez, Hugo Rasmussen, Avreeayl Ra, Michael Zerang, Dave Rempis, Jeb Bishop, Mars Williams, Jim Baker, Ben Street, Ed Thigpen, and many more.
Avreeayl Ra (percussion) was born in Chicago on May 21st, 1947, and still lives there today. Avreeayl is a long-term member of the Chicago AACM, his relationship with the seminal music organization having begun with early studies with AACM co-founder Kelan Philip Cohran. Avreeayl has performed and /or recorded with Fred Anderson, Amiri Baraka, Fontella Bass, Lester Bowie, Ari Brown, Oscar Brown, Jr., Henry Butler, Henry Byrd ("Professor Longhair"), Hamid Drake, Malachi Favors, Donald Raphael Garrett, Charles Gayle, Henry Grimes, Billy Harper, Joseph Jarman, Edward “Kidd” Jordan, Nicole Mitchell, Sun Ra, Pharoah Sanders, Malachi Thompson, and many more. Avreeayl considers himself greatly blessed to have come up in the richly progressive Chicago “avant-garde” jazz community. Though he has lived briefly in New Orleans and New York and has toured widely in the U.S., Canada, Europe, the Far East, and Africa, he has always returned home to live in Chicago.
Krzysztof Pabian hails from Europe as a classically-trained bassist. Krzysztof has performed with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and the Chicago Civic Orchestra and worked in an array of ensembles under the direction of Pierre Boulez, Daniel Barenboim, Christopher Eshenbach, Zubin Mehta, George Solti, Lawrence Foster, and Pinchas Zukerman, to name a few. In the area of jazz, Krzysztof has performed with Danilo Pérez, Judy Roberts, Eddie Henderson, Max Roach, Ron Blake, Hamid Drake, Mars Williams, Jarek Smietana and the Lincoln Center Jazz Sextet.
Jeb Bishop (trombone) has been active in jazz and improvised music since the mid-1990s. He first emerged as a key member in the vital scene in Chicago, where he lived until 2012. From then until 2022, he was based in North Carolina and then in Boston, and was part of many collaborations and projects in both those places. He returned to Chicago in spring 2022 and is now once again active there and internationally.
For more than fifteen years, cornetist, improviser, composer, and music presenter Josh Berman has been an essential contributor to Chicago’s active improvised music scene. His work encompasses both developing opportunities for presenting improvised music and performing in a variety of highly collaborative formats. He’s a co-founder of critically acclaimed Umbrella Music and curator of the Sunday night music series at the Hungry Brain. He’s performed as bandleader of his own groups, Josh Berman Trio, Josh Berman’s Old Idea, and Josh Berman and His Gang, and as co-leader of Chicago Luzern Exchange. In addition to his work as bandleader, Berman has performed and recorded with some of the most internationally respected musicians and composers in jazz and improvised music: Bill Dixon, Ab Baars, Keefe Jackson, Joe McPhee, Jason Adasiewicz, Mike Reed, Michael Moore, Ken Vandermark, Frank Rosaly, Rob Mazurek, Jason Stein, Jeb Bishop, Dave Rempis, Michael Zerang, Fred Lonberg-Holm, and Paul Lytton. Berman was named in the DownBeat critics’ poll among Rising Stars, Trumpet. He has toured the United States, Canada, Europe, and Japan.