Bassist Peter Brendler grew up in Baltimore, Maryland. He began his musical studies on electric bass, but soon gravitated towards the upright bass. He received his Bachelor of Music degree in 2001 from Berklee College of Music, where he was awarded the John Neves Scholarship for an upright bassist who shows outstanding promise and commitment. He performed extensively throughout the Boston area before relocating to NYC, where he earned his Masters in Music from Manhattan School of Music and is now one of the most in-demand bassists on the scene. He’s since worked with artists including John Abercrombie, Rich Perry, Victor Lewis, Jon Irabagon, and many more. Peter has also recorded three albums as a leader/co-leader, the latest of which, Message in Motion (Posi-Tone), was released in 2016.

Photo credit: Anna Yatskevich

Native New Yorker Charles Goold is one of the city's hardest-working jazz drummers of his generation. Son of legendary saxophonist Ned Goold, Charles gained a "real" jazz education from an early age, playing weekly gigs at Smalls with his father starting at age 14 and studying with many of the city's greats. A recent graduate of the Juilliard School, Goold has performed with a variety of artists from classic stalwarts like John Hendricks, The Cab Calloway Orchestra and Andy Bey, to more contemporary acts like Johnny O'Neal, Steve Nelson and Tony Bennet, Ne-Yo, Savion Glover and Brandon Flowers at the 2015 Tribeca Film Festival. He has also collaborated with rap legends Talib Kweli and Ghostface Killah, and performed in the off-Broadway musical Old Hats.

Originally from Oakland, California and a New Yorker from age 23, multi-instrumentalist and reedist Craig Handy is an internationally-renowned musician who was pronounced “a young star” by The New York Times at the age of 27. Tapped almost immediately by the legendary drummer Art Blakey, Handy went on to work in the bands of the seminal Roy Haynes, Abdullah Ibrahim and Betty Carter, leading to later gigs with Herbie Hancock, Wynton Marsalis, Freddie Hubbard, Joe Henderson, Elvin Jones, Kenny Barron, John Hicks and Dee Dee Bridgewater, among many others.

He has been a member of the Mingus Dynasty big band for over 20 years, also serving as their musical director for much of that time. Two of his four albums were New York Times' albums of the year.

Pianist Fintan O’Neill is from a musical family in Ireland where, drawn to jazz from an early age, he played with top Irish musicians. After moving to New York City in 1989, Fintan began studies with top pianists including Kenny Werner and Larry Willis, and has gone on to work with many of New York’s finest, including James Spaulding, Regina Carter, Steve Wilson, Lewis Nash, Peter Washington and Larry Coryell, to name just a few. His debut album as a leader, In The Moment (Amosaya Records), has received much critical acclaim, and his arrangements have been featured at a number of concerts in Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall. For some years he was the pianist for the Nelson Riddle Orchestra and ran the prestigious Blue Note Jam.

Phil Robson is a multi-award-winning, internationally-acclaimed guitarist, composer and bandleader. Originally from the UK, he relocated to NYC at the end of 2015 and is rapidly becoming one of the major figures on the music scene. He's worked with many of the greats, including David Liebman, Charles Earland, Steve Lacy, Maceo Parker, Barbra Streisand and BBC big band, and has also led his own bands featuring US stars such as Mark Turner, Billy Hart, Donny McCaslin, James Genus, Adam Nussbaum and many more. He and partner Christine Tobin have co-led the seminal UK band Partisans for more than 20 years.

Photo credit: Anthony Statham

Christine Tobin is an Irish vocalist, songwriter, and composer. She was an integral part of the London jazz scene before relocating to New York last year. Renowned for her unique rich voice and original compositional style, she has eleven highly acclaimed CDs under her own name and four major awards under her belt. In a five-star review of PELT, Christine’s new CD of settings of poems and lyrics by poet Paul Muldoon, BBC Music Magazine calls the album "a masterclass in songcraft," and The Guardian described her deeply expressive sound as "Tobin’s 24 carat voice." Awards include the 2012 British Composer Award for Sailing to Byzantium, her settings of WB Yeats' poems; the 2013 Herald Angel Award at the Edinburgh Festival for her concert A Thousand Kisses Deep; and 2014 Jazz Vocalist of the Year at the Parliamentary Jazz Awards. Christine is also a regular guest presenter on BBC Radio 3’s Jazz Library program.

Photo credit: Ian Anderson