Bobby Zankel / Chad Taylor (duo)

Bobby Zankel

Born on 21 December 1949 in New York City, Bobby Zankel began playing music at an early age, soon favoring the alto saxophone. After studying at the University of Wisconsin, he attended Berklee College of Music, then went on to attain a BA degree from Empire State College (State University of New York). In the early 70s, he attracted favorable attention during a spell with Cecil Taylor’s Unit Core Ensemble. Concurrently, Zankel’s reputation spread within the adventurous New York loft scene owing to performances with Ray Anderson, Sunny Murray, William Parker and others. From 1975, Zankel became a resident in Philadelphia where he raised his family, and at the same time established himself as a respected and in-demand sideman with many artists, notably those associated with the city’s thriving jazz scene. Groups he performed with in these years, in Philadelphia and elsewhere, included the Hank Mobley-Sonny Gillete Quintet, Jymmie Merritt’s Forerunners, Odean Pope’s Saxophone Choir, and Ruth Naomi Floyd. He continued to work with Cecil Taylor, including visits to Europe.

During this time, Zankel continued his studies, now with Dennis Sandole, becoming a skilled and influential composer. As a performer, Zankel delivers intricate virtuoso bebop lines, imbued with an intensely emotional core, and as leader and sideman he has appeared at numerous festivals. Among other musicians with whom Zankel has performed, and frequently recorded, are Johnny Coles, Ralph Peterson, Terri Lyne Carrington and Craig Handy. His abilities have been recognized in a variety of ways, to include receiving a Pennsylvania Council on the Arts Jazz Composition Fellowship and the Herman Goldman Award, the latter for his composition Cylle. In 1995 Zankel was awarded the prestigious Pew Fellowship for his writing. Grants he received through the late ‘80s allowed him to compose and present three jazz ballets and a jazz opera. His compositions have been performed by Lester Bowie, Coles, Marilyn Crispell, Pope, Jamaaladeen Tacuma, Peterson and others. Active in music education, Bobby Zankel has been artist-in-residence at the Downington and Jarrettown schools, and has also been artist-in-residence for programs within the Philadelphia prison system. He presently performs with his Warriors Of The Wonderful Sound.

Chad Taylor

It is difficult to overstate Chad Taylor’s contributions to improvised music over the past three decades. A composer, scholar and educator, as well as a capaciously inventive percussionist, now living in Philadelphia, Taylor is probably best known as co-founder of the Chicago Underground Duo with trumpeter Rob Mazurek (and the numerous Underground iterations that have spun off from that original partnership). A professional on the Chicago scene from the age of 16, Taylor became a rhythmic muse for many of the most celebrated artists in improvised music, including Fred Anderson, Pharoah Sanders, Nicole Mitchell, Matana Roberts, Ken Vandermark, Darius Jones, James Brandon Lewis, Jaimie Branch, Derek Bailey, Marc Ribot, and Peter Brötzmann. He has also led numerous acclaimed ensembles of his own.

Born in 1973 in Tempe, Arizona, Taylor grew up in Chicago and was shaped by the city’s wide open improvisational ethic. He earned a BFA in jazz performance from the New School and an MFA from Rutgers University in jazz research and history. He’s forged deep creative alliances with a dazzling array of artists, including guitarist Jeff Parker, multi-instrumentalist Cooper-Moore, bassist Tom Abbs, saxophonist Avram Fefer, guitarist Marc Ribot, and bassist Eric Revis. Taylor doesn’t have many releases under his own name, since he has tended to work in co-led or collective situations, but his compositions have been featured on dozens of albums.

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