Mary Oliver

About

Mary Oliver plays violin, viola and Hardanger fiddle, and she moves between the notated and the improvised without much fuss. Based in Amsterdam, she works in new music, free improvisation and avant garde jazz, and she's a regular voice in the Instant Composers Pool, where she performs and releases albums with the ICP Orchestra. Her record Witchfiddle came out on the ICP label too. As a soloist she has premiered pieces by composers like John Cage, Morton Feldman, Brian Ferneyhough, Liza Lim and George E. Lewis, and she has shared stages with improvisers such as Evan Parker, Joëlle Léandre, Misha Mengelberg and Phil Minton. Festivals like Donaueschingen, Darmstadt and Ars Electronica have booked her, and she's also a member of the Nieuw Ensemble, SONOR and KIVA. She holds a doctorate in the theory and practice of improvisation, which shapes how she plays, and she teaches at the Amsterdam University of the Arts.