SOUTH AMERICAN TOUR — NOVEMBER 2025
EUROPEAN TOUR — OCTOBER 2026

Saxophonist/clarinetist Ned Rothenberg, pianist Sylvie Courvoisier and drummer Nasheet Waits — three of New York City’s top improvisers for the past three decades — have convened to form Short Cuts, a collectively led trio informed by the progressive jazz tradition from Ornette to Zorn (not to mention modernist chamber music and cross-cultural approaches). With Short Cuts, abstraction is tempered by earthiness, in the time-honored New York way. Experimental textures meet rhythmic depth, harmonic sophistication abets free-flying lyricism; this all-improvised music grooves and it sings, swerving to avoid cliché all the while. “It feels so natural to improvise with Ned and Nasheet,” Courvoisier says. “They are such beautiful players, and they both love grooves, even in a freely improvised setting. Winds, piano, drums also make for a relatively uncommon trio, but not having a bass player gives Ned and I more room to play in the lower register, just as it gives Nasheet more freedom with his bass drum. And these guys love to take risks, like I do.”

Courvoisier, born and raised in Switzerland but a longtime New Yorker, leads multiple groups, including her trio with bassist Drew Gress and drummer Kenny Wollesen and her electric, atmospheric Chimaera ensemble with guitarist Christian Fennesz, as well as a new quartet, Almathea, featuring vibraphonist Patricia Brennan. Courvoisier also has a long-running duo with guitarist Mary Halvorson, and the pianist’s free-minded duo with trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith will release its debut recording later in 2025. NPR’s Kevin Whitehead has encapsulated Courvoisier’s method in an evocative way: “Some pianists approach the instrument like it’s a cathedral. Sylvie Courvoisier treats it like a playground.” Rothenberg — a virtuoso on clarinet, alto saxophone and shakuhachi flute — has been hailed as a sonic innovator by DownBeat, L.A. Weekly and Boston Globe. Along with being praised by The New York Times for the “near religious focus” in his solo performances, he has collaborated with such artists as Evan Parker, John Zorn, Sainkho Namchylak and Katsuya Yokoyama. Of Rothenberg’s work, Manfred Pabst of the Neue Züricher Zeitung has said: “Other kinds of music might entertain you, cheer you up or pump the blood, but his clarifies the mind and throws your soul wide open.”

Waits, long one of the most in-demand, pace-setting drummers on the New York scene, is renowned for his rhythmic propulsion and imaginative nuance whether the idiom leans left-of-center or full-on avant-garde. He has collaborated with Jason Moran, Dave Holland and Christian McBride, among myriad others, along with starring in the long-running cooperative trio Tarbaby with pianist Orrin Evans and bassist Eric Revis. Moran, in particular, has commended the fire and flair of Waits at the drumkit, particularly his ability to energize and elevate whatever music he plays, while Jazzwise magazine has highlighted the way his creative dynamism ranges from “whispers to frenzy.” Short Cuts — which has so far ranged from Austria’s Saalfelden Festival to the University of Mexico City (and a broadcast on Mexico’s national TV) — is recording its first album in spring 2025, with tours to follow across South America in November 2025 and Europe in October 2026. Characterizing the group’s appeal, Rothenberg says: “Some bands work off unity of sound, but this band operates with three distinct sound worlds, stylistically and sonically, that interact. Sylvie has a classical sensibility, and I have more of a world-music sensibility, so it’s fun for Nasheet — he can venture into a different vocabulary than with a more typical free-jazz improvising trio. And for the audience, they are sort of eavesdropping on what we hope is an interesting, intimate conversation among three sympathetic artists.”

— Bradley Bambarger