Mat Maneri

Mat Maneri is one of the leading violists in creative improvised music, known for a microtonal approach that bends jazz phrasing into the pitches between the notes. Born in Brooklyn in 1969, he grew up inside that language as the son of microtonal composer and saxophonist Joe Maneri, with whom he recorded a series of ECM albums including Three Men Walking (1995), Blessed (1997) and Tales of Rohnlief (2000). He began leading his own dates in 1996 and released Trinity on ECM in 2001, and has played alongside Cecil Taylor, Matthew Shipp, Paul Motian, Tim Berne and Joe Morris. His long partnership with Romanian pianist Lucian Ban produced the duo album Transylvanian Dance (2024). Maneri's New York quartet with Ban, bassist John Hébert and drummer Randy Peterson recorded the trilogy Dust (2019), Ash (2023) and Mist.