By overwhelming consensus, The Vijay Iyer Trio has become one of the pivotal jazz bands of the twenty-first century. Called “the best piano trio in jazz today” (Der Spiegel), “truly astonishing” (NPR), and “the best band in jazz” (PopMatters), the trio makes “cutting-edge music, but always accessible” (The Guardian). Grammy Award-nominated composer-pianist Vijay Iyer, DownBeat Critics Poll Rising Star Linda May Han Oh on bass, and MacArthur Fellow Tyshawn Sorey on drums form the group that Jazzwise says “has the potential to alter the scope, ambition, and language of jazz piano forever.”
Vijay Iyer
Composer-pianist Vijay Iyer (pronounced “VID-jay EYE-yer”) was described by Pitchfork as “one of the most interesting and vital young pianists in jazz today,” by Los Angeles Weekly as “a boundless and deeply important young star,” and by Minnesota Public Radio as “an American treasure.” A Grammy Award nominee, Iyer has been voted DownBeat magazine’s Artist of the Year four times (2018, 2016, 2015, and 2012). The Vijay Iyer Sextet was DownBeat’s Group of the Year in 2018, with Iyer also named DownBeat’s 2014 Pianist of the Year, a 2013 MacArthur Fellow, and a 2012 Doris Duke Performing Artist. Iyer has released twenty recordings under his own name, including the recent Mutations, Radhe Radhe: Rites of Holi, Break Stuff. As a composer he has had works commissioned and premiered by Arturo O’Farrill’s Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra, American Composers Orchestra, Bang on a Can All-Stars, Brentano Quartet, Brooklyn Rider, Imani Winds, International Contemporary Ensemble, violinist Jennifer Koh, and Yo-Yo Ma’s Silk Road Ensemble. Iyer is the Franklin D. and Florence Rosenblatt Professor of the Arts at Harvard University, with joint affiliations in the Department of Music and the Department of African and African American Studies, and the Artistic Director of the Banff International Workshop in Jazz and Creative Music. He is a Steinway artist.
Linda May Han Oh
Linda May Han Oh is a bassist and composer who has performed and recorded with artists such as Pat Metheny, Kenny Barron, Joe Lovano, Dave Douglas, Terri Lyne Carrington, Steve Wilson and Geri Allen. Originally born in Malaysia and raised in Perth, Western Australia, based in New York City, she has received many awards including second place at the BASS2010 Competition and 2010 Bell Award for Young Australian Artist of the Year. She received an honorary mention at the 2009 Thelonious Monk Bass Competition, was named a semi-finalist of the BMW Jazz Competition, and was named the 2012 Downbeat Critic’s Poll “Rising Star” on bass. She was voted the 2018 and 2019 Bassist of the Year and 2019 Up-and-coming Artist of the Year by the Jazz Journalists Association. She recently received a Jerome Foundation Fellowship, as well as the Chamber Music America New Jazz Works Grant for 2019. Oh has released five albums as a leader, which have received critical acclaim, the most recent being Aventurine. She has written for large and small ensembles as well as for films, participating in the BMI Film Composers Workshop and Sundance Labs at Skywalker Ranch, and has scored two short films directed by Sabrina McCormick. Oh is on faculty at the New School and Berklee College of Music. As an educator she has created a series of lessons for the BassGuru app for iPad and iPhone.
Tyshawn Sorey
Newark-born multi-instrumentalist and composer Tyshawn Sorey is celebrated for his incomparable virtuosity, effortless mastery and memorization of highly complex scores, and an extraordinary ability to blend composition and improvisation in his work. Sorey has received support for his creative projects from The Jerome Foundation and The Shifting Foundation, received a Van Lier Fellowship and a 2015 Doris Duke Impact Award, and was named a 2017 MacArthur Fellow. The Spektral Quartet, Ojai Music Festival, and International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE) have commissioned his works. Future commissions include a residency at the Berlin Jazz Festival and Carnegie Hall’s 125 Commissions Project in partnership with Opera Philadelphia supporting a new work for tenor Lawrence Brownlee addressing themes associated with Black Lives Matter. As a leader, Sorey has released six critically acclaimed recordings, including his latest, Verisimilitude (Pi Recordings, 2017). His work has been premiered at Lincoln Center’s Mostly Mozart Festival, Ojai Music Festival, The Kitchen, Walt Disney Hall, Roulette, Issue Project Room, and the Stone, among many other established venues and festivals. As of Fall 2017 he has held the role of Assistant Professor of Composition and Creative Music at Wesleyan University, where he received his Masters degree in Composition in 2011.