Carlo Mombelli

BIO

The South African composer/bassist has recorded and performed at many international festivals, including the Rome Villa Celimontana Jazz Festival, the Stockholm Jazz Festival, the German Moers and the ‘Leipziger Jazztage’ festivals , Banlieues Bleues festival in Paris, the ‘On the edge of Wrong’ festival in Norway, with amongst others, Mick Goodrick, Charlie Mariano, Jeroen van Vliet, Malcolm Braff and Samuel Bläser.

He has recorded on Enja Records with Egberto Gismonti as well as with Lee Konitz, and has contributed music and played on the 1989 tribute for Jaco Pastorius, ‘Basstorius’, that also features the bassists Mathew Garrison and Carles Benavent. He worked for two years with the Paris based company Lutherie Urbaine on community projects building instruments out of recycled material, and back home in South Africa he can be heard as a bassist on many recordings with amongst others, Marcus Wyatt, Simphiwe Dana, Sibongile Khumalo and Miriam Makeba. As a producer he worked on the Shane Cooper album ‘Oscillations’ that won the jazz album of the year at the 2014 SAMA awards.

Besides several ballets that have been choreographed to his music, and his many composition commissions that include commissions for the ‘Stockholm Saxophone Quartet’ and his recent 2013 piece for the Grammy award-winning New York String Quartet ‘Ethel’, he has been nominated three times for a SAMA (South African Music Awards) for his recordings. He currently teaches at Wits University, Johannesburg, where he received his doctorate in composition in 2009.