Hayden Chisholm — saxophone

Born in Auckland and raised in New Plymouth, Hayden Chisholm has risen to become one of Europe's most distinctive and innovative voices on the saxophone. Encouraged by his parents, he began piano at the age of eight and clarinet two years later, with his first saxophone experience coming in local school and Dixieland bands. At seventeen he moved to Switzerland and soon began his music studies in Germany. After studying in Cologne on a DAAD scholarship, he continued his musical studies in Japan and India. His compositions have been recorded by BBC and WDR radio, and he has toured extensively worldwide as a soloist. He has created music for installations by artist Rebecca Horn and composed music for the acclaimed film "Moon Mirror Journey." He is credited with developing a new microtonal language for saxophone in the mid-1990s, and in 2011 he launched the Moontower Foundation Music Edition.

Achim Kaufmann — piano

Achim Kaufmann (b. 1962 in Aachen) grew up in a musical family — his mother a piano teacher, his father a conductor. From 1984 he studied at the Cologne music conservatory under Frank Wunsch and Rainer Brüninghaus, followed by postgraduate study at the Banff Centre for the Arts in Canada with Dave Holland, Steve Coleman, Muhal Richard Abrams, George Lewis, and Richie Beirach, as well as private lessons with Steve Lacy in Paris. His long-standing projects include the piano trio grünen (with Christian Lillinger and Robert Landfermann), a duo with Amsterdam-based clarinetist Michael Moore, and the improvising trio Kaufmann/Gratkowski/de Joode. He received the SWR Jazz Prize in 2001 and the Albert Mangelsdorff Prize in 2015. Since 2018 he has held a professorship for jazz piano and ensemble at the Franz Liszt School of Music Weimar and lives in Berlin.

Petter Eldh — bass

Frans Petter Eldh (b. 19 September 1983 in Gothenburg) is a Swedish jazz bassist who worked predominantly in Denmark before settling in Berlin in 2009. He grew up in a family of artists — his mother is accordionist Kiki Eldh. He began playing guitar at eight, switched to double bass three years later, and turned to jazz at thirteen under the influence of Charlie Parker. He studied at Uddevalla Musikhochschule (1999–2002) and the Skurup Jazz School (2002–2004) before completing his master's at the Rhythmic Music Conservatory Copenhagen in 2009. Eldh works with artists including Django Bates, the trio Punkt.Vrt.Plastik (with Kaja Draksler and Christian Lillinger), and numerous other projects such as Amok Amor and Koma Saxo. He received the German Jazz Prize in 2022.

Jonas Burgwinkel — drums

Jonas Burgwinkel (b. 1981 in Aachen) is a German drummer working in creative jazz. At seventeen he began his studies at the Maastricht Conservatory, followed by a one-year scholarship at Berklee College of Music in Boston and drum studies at the Cologne University of Music, completed in 2009, including lessons with Jamey Haddad and Ralph Peterson. Since 2006 he has played in the Pablo Held Trio with Robert Landfermann and Pablo Held, and in 2009 was a founding member of the Cologne jazz collective KLAENG. He has toured every continent, performing with artists including John Scofield, Chris Potter, Lee Konitz, and Dave Liebman. Burgwinkel received the ECHO Jazz Award 2012 for best drummer, as well as the WDR and SWR Jazz Prizes, and has been professor of jazz drums at the Cologne University of Music and Dance since 2011.