Atlas Maior gives a workshop for the Improvisers Exchange Ensemble and members of the public.
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On October 24, 2025, guest ensemble Atlas Maior visited the School of Music for a workshop with the Improvisers Exchange Ensemble. After working with the Improvisers Exchange, Atlas Maior posted on Instagram, saying, “One of the highlights of the past 2 months was getting the opportunity to work with music students at The University of Illinois after our Krannert Center concert. Our time in Champaign-Urbana was well spent, as we shared our creative approach to improvisation and composition. We enjoyed listening and improvising with these up and coming students. The University of Illinois has talented musicians with bright futures. What a rewarding experience it was spending this time with them.”
Improvisers Exchange Workshops provide opportunity to engage in sound and thought with leading figures in the field. Improvisers Exchange was created in Fall 2017 through a two-year initiative deeply investigating the field of music improvisation. The seed years of Improvisers Exchange offered multifaceted programming featuring performance and engagement residencies by leading artists representative of a wide spectrum of the practice, initiated a new performance course on improvisation for students, and promoted scholarly discourse through lectures and panel discussions. In Spring 2019, Jason Finkelman (Artistic Director, Global Arts Performance Initiatives) and Mike Silvers (Musicology) offered a graduate seminar on Music, Improvisation and Ecology as CAS Resident Associates for AY2018-19. Improvisers Exchange remains an ensemble class that explores omni-idiomatic improvised music and an occasional concert and workshop series. Improvisers Exchange was established through a Center for Advanced Study Annual Initiative. The performance ensemble broadly examines the field of music improvisation and is open to musicians of all genres who seek to explore omni-idiomatic improvisation, listening and performance strategies for the improviser, and engagement with visiting artists in the field. The ensemble is led by Jason Finkelman, who performs on African and Brazilian percussion and laptop electronics. Finkelman is a founding member of the ambient, avant world trio Straylight and has performed with a diverse range of improvising artists including Pauline Oliveros, Roy Campbell, Jr., Steve Gorn, and Vernon Reid.
Atlas Maior creates original music informed by Jazz, Free Improvisation, and the musical traditions of the Middle East, Africa, Latin America, and India. Band members Joshua Thomson (alto saxophone, flutes), Josh Peters (oud, lutar), Josh Flowers (upright bass), and Gray Parsons (drums) often create cinematic soundscapes that balance intimate moments of sincerity with powerful melodies and incendiary rhythmic passages. The group writes original compositions that blend maqamat (Middle Eastern modal system) with harmonic progressions found in American jazz, resulting in a distinct evocative sound. Atlas Maior composes with a variety of instrumentation, including the oud, Chinese hulusi, saxophone, and lutar. The band often improvises within conceptual frameworks, or freely without form. Atlas Maior’s approach often expands and contracts the group’s sound through a commitment to dynamics and textural accentuations.
Atlas Maior gives a workshop for the Improvisers Exchange Ensemble and members of the public.
