Vijay Iyer

New York based US jazz pianist, violinist and composer, born in Albany, NY, on 26th october, 1971.

He has no formal piano/composing education, but studied violin privately; he received basic composing and improvisational lectures at Eastman School of Music, Rochester, NY.

He graduated with B.S. in Mathematics & Physics from Yale University, and holds a M.A. in Physics and Ph.D. in Technology and the Arts from the University of California at Berkeley; his research was focused on music and cogitive sciences.

Beside ongoing engagements in New York he has played all over the world as a leader and sideman (notable musicians whom he played with include [a=Roscoe Mitchell], [a=Steve Coleman], [a=Amiri Baraka], [a=John Zorn], [a=Wadada Leo Smith] and many others. His most important collaborator is the saxophonist [a=Rudresh Mahanthappa].

Beside Jazz music he also composed many classical music works for orchestra and smaller ensembles.