Master Class: France-Canada Distinguished Visitor in Music: Michaël Attias, alto saxophone

Michaël Attias has earned a reputation as one of the most questing and keenly collaborative figures on the 21st-century New York Jazz and Improvised Music scene, with a background and outlook that make him “an emphatically cosmopolitan saxophonist and composer,” according to The New York Times. He has put out eight albums as a leader, most recently the alto saxophone/piano solo échos la nuit (Out of Your Head, 2019) and Nerve Dance (Clean Feed, 2017). Spring and Fall 2024 will see the release of Quartet Music Vols I & II, two new albums which display an aesthetic of enormous range, emotional power and vivaciousness. Among his current projects are the longstanding collaborative trio RENKU with John Hébert and Satoshi Takeishi; Kardamon Fall with Santiago Leibson, Sean Conly and Tom Rainey; and LuMiSong with Leibson, Matt Pavolka, and Mark Ferber. As a sideman, he has worked in the bands of such luminaries as Anthony Braxton, Paul Motian, Oliver Lake, Masabumi Kikuchi, Michael Formanek, Ralph Alessi, Tony Malaby, Kris Davis, Andy Milne, Angelica Sanchez, Francisco Mela, Fay Victor... Attias has also composed for orchestra and big band; created several live electroacoustic scores and sound designs for legendary theatre director Robert Woodruff; and his music has been covered by artists including Eric Revis, Anthony Coleman, and most recently Kris Davis with Esperanza Spaulding.