Nicole mitchell flutist biography

Bio

Nicole Mitchell was born in 1967 in Syracuse, New York. Her family moved to Anaheim, California when she was eight years old. She got her start in music bery early, playing both the piano and the viola by age 9. When she was in California with her family, she would often busk on the street with her flute. She attended Oberlin College for music in 1987, and in 1990 she moved to Chicago. She would integrate herself fully with the jazz and avant-garde scene there, playing with the group Semana, and working for Third World Press. She went on to be president of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians and also work closely with the Jazz Institute of Chicago. In the mid 90-s, she created her group the Black Earth Ensembles. She went on to serve as faculty at UC Irvine, and eventually as the head of the jazz program at the University of Pittsburgh. Over her long career, she has shared the stage with Craig Taborn, Roscoe Mitchell, Anthony BRaxton, Geri Allen, Steve Coleman, Billy Childs, and Hamid Drake. 

Nicole Mitchell is an award-winning creative flutist, conceptualist, composer, bandleader and educator. Having emerged from Chicago's creative music community, she is the former first woman president of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM). For over twenty years, Mitchell has utilized her art to create worlds that “bridge the familiar with the unknown,” with her Black Earth Ensemble. She also composes for contemporary ensembles of varied instrumentation and size (from solo to orchestra and big band) while incorporating improvisation and a wide range of aesthetic expressions. She is perhaps best known for her work as a creative flutist, having developed a unique improvisational language which has repeatedly awarded her “Top Flutist of the Year” by Downbeat Magazine's Critics Poll from 2010-2024. Mitchell is a Professor of Music at the University of Virginia. Mark Sanders is a drummer/percussionist of British-Belizean heritage, known for his playing in the fields of free jazz and free improvisation, while also utilizing his skills and versatility across various genres, having worked with numerous artists, including Roscoe Mitchell, Derek Bailey, Jah Wobble, Bill Laswell, Thurston Moore, Mathew Shipp, Evan Parker, Wadada Leo Smith and William Parker, among others. In duo with Nicole Mitchell, they create a strikingly sparse and minimal sound that remains full of joyous melodic hooks and grooves, reminiscent of a stripped-back Art Ensemble of Chicago.

Biography

Nicole Mitchell Gantt is an award-winning creative flutist, composer, conceptualist, bandleader and educator. A United States Artist (2020), a Doris Duke Artist (2012), and a recipient of the Herb Alpert Award (2011) her research centers on the powerful legacy of contemporary African American culture and black experimental art. For over 20 years, Mitchell’s critically acclaimed Chicago-based Black Earth Ensemble (BEE) has been her primary compositional laboratory with which she has performed at festivals and art venues throughout Europe, Canada, and the US. The former first woman president of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM), Mitchell composes for contemporary ensembles of varied instrumentation and size (from solo to orchestra and large jazz band) while incorporating improvisation and a wide aesthetic expression. She is perhaps best known for her work as a flutist, having developed a unique improvisational language and having been repeatedly awarded “Top Flutist of the Year” by Downbeat Magazine Critics Poll and the Jazz Journalists Association (2010-2022). Mitchell initially emerged from Chicago’s innovative music scene in the late 90s, having started as a co-founder of the all-woman group Samana, and a member of the David Boykin Expanse. Much of Mitchell’s creative process has been informed by literature and narrative, with a special interest in science fiction. Her album, Mandorla Awakening (FPE, 2017), combines Afrofuturism with intercultural collaboration and was selected by the New York Times as the #1 jazz album of 2017. As a composer, she has been commissioned by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra's Music NOW, French Ministry of Culture, the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, the Newport Jazz Festival, the Art Institute of Chicago, the French American Jazz Exchange, Chamber Music America, the Chicago Jazz Festival, International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE), and Bang