Jane Ira Bloom Quartet

Soprano saxophonist Jane Ira Bloom and her quartet featuring Dawn Clement, piano, Mark Helias, bass, and Jaz Sawyer, drums.

Soprano saxophonist/composer Jane Ira Bloom is a pioneer in the use of live electronics and movement in jazz, as well as a frequent collaborator with such outstanding jazz and world music artists as Charlie Haden, Ed Blackwell, Kenny Wheeler, Rufus Reid, Bob Brookmeyer, Julian Priester, Jerry Granelli, Min Xiao-Fen, Mark Dresser, Matt Wilson, Bobby Previte, and Fred Hersch. She has composed and performed site-specific works at such diverse venues as the National Air and Space Museum’s Einstein Planetarium, Carnegie Hall, Jazz at Lincoln Center, the Museum of Modern Arts, the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, Town Hall, the Kennedy Space Center, the Houston Astrodome, and the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts as well as at clubs and jazz festivals worldwide. Bloom is the recipient of numerous composition and performance grants including a Guggenheim Fellowship in music composition. Winner of the Mary Lou Williams Women In Jazz Award for lifetime service to jazz, the Jazz Journalists Association and Downbeat International Critics Poll for soprano sax, and the International Women in Jazz Masters Award, Bloom was also the first musician ever commissioned by the NASA Art Program and to have an asteroid named in her honor by the International Astronomical Union (asteroid: 6083janeirabloom).

Bloom has recorded and produced thirteen albums of her music dating from 1977 to the present. In 1976 she founded her own recording publishing company (Outline Music). She has also recorded for ENJA, CBS, Arabesque and Artistshare Records. She has composed for the Pilobolus, Philadanco, and Paradigm Dance Companies, the St Luke’s Chamber Ensemble, and the American Composers Orchestra. She has received Doris Duke/CMA New Jazz Works awards for Chasing Paint a series of compositions inspired by Jackson Pollock’s action painting and for Mental Weather, a suite for her jazz quartet featuring Dawn Clement, Mark Helias, and Matt Wilson.

Bloom is on the fulltime faculty of the New School for Jazz and Contemporary Music in New York City. She holds degrees from Yale University and Yale School of Music and studied saxophone with woodwind virtuoso Joseph Viola. Jazz critic Nat Hentoff has called Bloom an artist “beyond category.”

Pianist/composer and Cornish alum Dawn Clement maintains a hectic schedule between teaching, touring, recording and performing with Jane Ira Bloom’s quartet and her own trio with Matt Wilson and Dean Johnson. In addition to Bloom, Clement has toured the U.S. with the Sabella Consort and the Rubin/Clement Piano Dialogues. Clement has also performed with such notable artists as Pharaoh Sanders, Nancy King, Ingrid Jensen, Louis Moutin, Hadley Caliman, Mercer Ellington, Mark Helius, Mark Dresser, and Bobby Previte. Over the last seven years, Clement has performed in some of the world’s premier venues including Carnegie Hall, Le Conservatoire Superieur, Paris, the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, and Seattle’s Benaroya Hall, as well as numerous clubs (Sweet Rhythm, Tonic, and Iridium), art museums, and theaters. Clement also has been the recipient of numerous accolades and awards including an invitation to compete at the Third International Martial Solal Jazz Piano Competition in Paris, France (2002), the Earshot Jazz awards for “Best Emerging Artist” (2000), “Best Jazz Quartet” and “Best Album” for her performance with trombonist Priester (2003), and a nomination for “Earshot Jazz Record of the Year” (2004) for her CD Hush. She also finished as one of the top five finalists in the Mary Lou Williams Jazz Piano Competition (2006).

Bassist and composer Mark Helias studied with Homer Mensch at Rutgers University and Yale School of Music, and embarked on an international performance career with the Anthony Braxton quartet in 1977. Since then he has enjoyed long musical associations with Edward Blackwell, Anthony Davis, Dewey Redman, Ray Anderson, Don Cherry and Gerry Hemingway. Since 1984, eleven albums of his music have been released including Split Image, The Current Set (1987), Desert Blue (1989), Attack The Future (1992), Loopin' the Cool (1995), Fictionary (1998), Come Ahead Back (1998) New School (2001), Verbs of Will (2004), Atomic Clock (2006) and Strange Unison (2009). A prolific composer, Helias has composed music for two feature films as well as chamber pieces and works for large ensemble and big band. He has been producing recordings for other artists on the Gramavision, Enja, New World, Sound Aspects, and Avant/DIW labels. His trio, Open Loose with Tony Malaby and Tom Rainey, has become an archetypal improvising ensemble on the New York scene. He continues performing and recording with BassDrumBone, a three decade long collaboration with Gerry Hemingway and Ray Anderson. He teaches at Sarah Lawrence College, The New School and SIM (School for Improvised Music) and is committed to broadening the scope of musical education.

Jaz Sawyer has worked with Wynton Marsalis, George Benson, Santana, The Grateful Dead, The San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, Bobby Hutcherson, Jacky Terrasson, Irvin Mayfield, Abbey Lincoln, and many others. He holds a B.F.A. degree from the Mannes Jazz and Contemporary Music program and a Master of Public Administration degree from the Metropolitan College of New York.