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.