Gabriel Yared (Arabic: جبرائيل يارد) (born 7 October 1949) is a Lebanese-French composer, best known for his work in French and American cinema. Born in Beirut, Lebanon, his work in France included the scores for Betty Blue and Camille Claudel. He later began working with American film directors, winning an Oscar for his score for The English Patient and a nomination for The Talented Mr. Ripley and Cold Mountain.
Ken Vandermark formed his quintet, the VANDERMARK 5, during the spring of 1996. Since that time it has been a major outlet for compositional and improvisational ideas that have been fascinating its leader, whose thinking has been developed through years of work with groups like the NRG Ensemble, AALY, the Peter Brötzmann Chicago Tentet, Free Music Ensemble, School Days, Free Fall, the Territory Band, Powerhouse Sound, Frame Quartet, and the Resonance Ensemble- the members of which represent an international gallery of the cutting edge of contemporary music.
Black Uhuru is a Jamaican reggae band probably best known for their hits "Shine Eye Gal", "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner," "Sinsemilla," "Solidarity," and "What Is Life?". They were the first group to win a Grammy in the reggae category when it was introduced in 1985. They originally formed as 'Black Sounds Uhuru' (the Kiswahili word for freedom). The first line-up of the group was Garth Dennis, Don Carlos, and Derrick "Duckie" Simpson.
Conceived in March of 2008 in Canterbury, Delta Sleep was driven by a desire to create fun and original, forward-thinking music. Made of self-taught and honest musicians, their songs are as complex as they are catchy. Their music combines guitar driven melodies, held together by jazz influenced percussion and relentless bass, topped with sprinkles of left-field electronica. To coin Delta Sleep’s sound is a hard task indeed, but has once been described by a wise old man as an “enchanted battle between At The Drive-In and Mogwai for the city of Radiohead in the land of Aphex Twin”.
Keb' Mo' (born October 3, 1951 in South Los Angeles, California as Kevin Moore) is an American blues singer, guitarist, and songwriter. He first started recording in the early 1970s with Jefferson Airplane violinist Papa John Creach. Creach hired him when Moore was just twenty-one years old; Moore appeared on four of Creach's albums. He was further immersed in the blues with his long stint in the Whodunit Band, headed by Bobby "Blue" Bland producer Monk Higgins. Moore jammed with Albert Collins and Big Joe Turner.
The former alias of Dan Snaith, an electronic musician from Dundas, Ontario, Canada. Snaith renamed himself Caribou in 2004 under threat of an American lawsuit by Richard "Handsome Dick" Manitoba, who had used the surname professionally since the 1970s but has not released any music as a solo artist. Manitoba's critically acclaimed album "Up In Flames" has since been re-released under the Caribou name and listed as such in discographies.