13 Facts About Matthew Shipp

Matthew Shipp's mother was a friend of trumpeter Clifford Brown.

Matthew Shipp attended the University of Delaware for "a couple years" before dropping out.

Matthew Shipp opted instead to live with his parents and focus on practicing, though he frequently traveled to Philadelphia to pick up gigs as a cocktail pianist and to study with Dennis Sandole, who Shipp has cited as playing an important role in his development.

Matthew Shipp later spent a year at the New England Conservatory of Music, where he studied with saxophonist and composer Joe Maneri, but again dropped out without completing a degree.

Matthew Shipp moved to New York in 1984 and has been very active since the early 1990s, appearing on dozens of albums as a leader, sideman, or producer.

Matthew Shipp was fired, he threw some books at his boss, and he decided he would not look for a day job anymore.

Matthew Shipp was initially most active in free jazz but has since branched out, particularly exploring music that touches on contemporary classical, hip hop, and electronica.

Matthew Shipp is not only a brilliant Jazz pianist, he is a true artist and visionary.

One of the first people Shipp sought out upon arriving in New York was William Parker, who he knew from his recordings with Cecil Taylor; Parker later recommended him for saxophonist David S Ware's quartet, alongside Parker himself and a series of drummers.

Matthew Shipp was a member of Roscoe Mitchell's Note Factory, which Matthew Shipp said "could be seen as an extension of some post-Coltrane concepts, but in Roscoe's hands it is extended technique with multiple pulses", noting "[Mitchell's] insistence at all times of transcending cliche".

Matthew Shipp has recorded or performed with many other musicians, including High Priest and Beans of Antipop Consortium, Michael Bisio, Daniel Carter, DJ Spooky, El-P, Mat Maneri, Joe Morris, Ivo Perelman, Mat Walerian, Allen Lowe, and Chad Fowler.

Matthew Shipp has co-led the group East Axis, with bassist Kevin Ray, drummer Gerald Cleaver, and saxophonists Allen Lowe and Scott Robinson.

All four of Walerian's albums with Matthew Shipp have been released on ESP-Disk'.