Craig Taborn has been a regular presence at recent editions of Guimarães Jazz, in a festival that usually avoids excessive repetition of musicians in its programs. This exception is explained by two mutually influential factors: on one hand, it shows that the pianist is one of the most sought-after instrumentalists in the contemporary jazz circuit, a logical consequence of being a pianist with remarkable technical abilities who is simultaneously a highly creative performer and composer. With a musical career branching out into both solo projects and collaborative partnerships with great jazz musicians like Roscoe Mitchell, Chris Potter, William Parker, Peter Evans, and Vijay Iyer, Craig Taborn is above all a creator of interactive musical ecosystems that operate through processes of inclusion and exclusion of constantly evolving premises, which is why his work is one of the most original and interesting cases in contemporary music.

Tomeka Reid is a composer and improviser with classical music training and a stylistic approach that reflects the absorption of various musical traditions, including obviously jazz, but also African diaspora music and the abstract minimalism of the Western avant-garde movement. Having been a member for several years of the Art Ensemble of Chicago, the seminal music collective that emerged from the AACM, Reid participates in various ensembles both as leader or co-leader and in collaboration with musicians of her generation or historic jazz names such as Roscoe Mitchell, Fred Anderson, and Muhal Richard Abrams. As an instrumentalist, Tomeka Reid stands out for the sonically expansive style of her approach, frequently using unconventional cello manipulation techniques and exploring not only its melodic qualities but also rhythmic and percussive ones.

Born in Sacramento, California, Ches Smith is a drummer, percussionist, and composer based in New York, and a prominent musician in the intersection of jazz with experimental trends and the more extreme styles of rock, noise music, and heavy metal that decisively marked the first decades of the 21st century. In this context, he has collaborated extensively with key figures of that musical scene such as John Zorn, Tim Berne, Nels Cline, and Trevor Dunn, as well as bands like Secret Chiefs 3, Xiu Xiu, and Mike Patton’s Mr. Bungle. Besides his work as a performer, Ches Smith has released nine albums as a leader to date and is also a dedicated student of the Haitian Vodou percussion tradition, having performed in numerous religious and folkloric events over the years.