Michael Formanek

A widely acclaimed bassist, composer, and educator, Michael Formanek is a major presence in the modern creative jazz scene. By the time of his 1990 debut album, Wide Open Spaces, Formanek had already proven himself a skillful sideman working with the likes of Freddie Hubbard, Joe Henderson, Dave Liebman, and Fred Hersch, among others. Throughout the '90s, he developed a simpatico partnership with saxophonist Tim Berne, performing and recording in duet and in Berne's Bloodcount quartet. In the new millennium, Formanek recorded for ECM, releasing The Rub and Spare Change and Small Places. He moved to Cuneiform for 2014's Thumbscrew, introducing his group of the same name with guitarist Mary Halvorson and drummer Tony Fujiwara. Along with teaching on the jazz faculty of Baltimore's Peabody Institute, he also leads other vital groups, including Drome Trio with Chet Doxas and Vinnie Sperrazza, and the Elusion Quartet with alto saxophonist Tony Malaby, pianist Kris Davis, and drummer Ches Smith. In 2018, he was back with Thumbscrew for Ours and Theirs, followed by 2026's New Digs. Born in 1958 in San Francisco, Formanek grew up nearby in Pacifica where his father introduced him to an array of jazz, blues, and classical albums. He started on guitar as a child, but had switched to bass by his teens. It was while still a teenager that he began playing professionally, working early on with luminaries like Joe Henderson, Tony Williams, and others. In 1978, he moved to New York City where he continued to find lucrative work throughout the '80s playing with major artists like Freddie Hubbard, Stan Getz, Gerry Mulligan, Fred Hersch, and Dave Liebman. He debuted as a leader with 1990's Wide Open Spaces, showcasing his ability to write widely varied compositions emphasizing the strong talents of his own ensemble members (in this case saxophonist Greg Osby, violinist Mark Feldman, guitarist Wayne Krantz, and drummer Jeff Hirshfield). In 1992, Enja released Formanek's second recording, Extended Animation, which featured the same bandmembers as Wide Open Spaces except for one important difference: a switch in saxophonist from Osby to Tim Berne. From the unison bass-sax line in the opening measures of the first tune "Liar's Web," the compatibility of Formanek and Berne was apparent; they would continue a fruitful musical partnership for the remainder of the decade and beyond. Also in 1992, Formanek, Berne, and Hirshfield entered the studio to record Loose Cannon for Italian producer Giovanni Bonandrini's Soul Note label. This trio session, with bass and sax squarely in the spotlight, further cemented the nascent Formanek-Berne relationship. Loose Cannon was released in 1993, as Formanek returned to the studio for another Enja session, this time with his largest group yet. The septet on Low Profile included Formanek and Berne along with trumpeter Dave Douglas, multi-reedist Marty Ehrlich, trombonist Ku-umba Frank Lacy, drummer Marvin "Smitty" Smith, and pianist Salvatore Bonafede. Meanwhile, Berne decided to tap Formanek for Bloodcount, his quartet also featuring saxophonist/clarinetist Chris Speed and drummer Jim Black. In September 1994, the four musicians, plus guitarist Marc Ducret, recorded several nights of concerts for Stefan Winter's JMT label; the resulting music was released in 1995 on a trio of Bloodcount albums: Lowlife, Poisoned Minds, and Memory Select. The demise of JMT came soon after, but Bloodcount continued to record (minus Ducret) for Berne's Screwgun label. Formanek appeared on three Bloodcount recordings issued by Screwgun: the Bloodcount Unwound box set (1996), as well as Discretion and Saturation Point (both 1997). Still under contract to Enja, Formanek recorded Nature of the Beast, his fourth album for the label, in 1996. The album was released the following year and featured a core quartet including trumpeter Douglas, trombonist Steve Swell, and a drummer with whom Formanek had been developing a particularly strong rapport: Bloodcount's Jim Black. Also making appearances on selected tracks were Berne, Speed, and tenor saxophonist Tony Malaby. As the 1990s drew to a close, Berne put Bloodcount on hold, but Formanek continued his liaison with the saxophonist. They toured throughout the United States as a duo and in 1998 released Ornery People on the Little Brother label. That same year, Screwgun issued Am I Bothering You?, a Formanek solo project that fully revealed the bassist's improvisational skills and mastery of extended techniques. In addition, Formanek toured in 1998 as a member of drummer Gerry Hemingway's new American quartet, which also included trombonist Ray Anderson and tenor saxophonist Ellery Eskelin. On the 1999's Relativity, Formanek appeared in a new collaborative trio with reedman Ehrlich and drummer Peter Erskine. At the June 2000 Bell Atlantic Jazz Festival in New York City, Formanek premiered Northern Exposure, a new quartet with drummer Black, trumpeter Dave Ballou, and saxophonist Henrik Frisk. Despite all this activity, Formanek remained an in-demand session bassist throughout the 1990s, performing on albums by Jane Ira Bloom, Uri Caine, Marty Ehrlich, James Emery, Lee Konitz, Kevin Mahogany, the Mingus Big Band, the New York Jazz Collective, Daniel Schnyder, and Jack Walrath. By the year 2000, he had appeared on over 60 recordings as leader, collaborator, or sideman. At the beginning of the new millennium, Formanek moved with his family from eastern Pennsylvania to the Baltimore area after accepting a limited-time faculty appointment to the Jazz Studies Department at Baltimore's Peabody Conservatory, one of the oldest music conservatories in the U.S. and since 1977 an affiliate of Johns Hopkins University. He was subsequently appointed as a full-time faculty member, and -- while continuing to participate in a number of recordings as a sideman -- he devoted considerable creative energy to the academic arena for the remainder of the decade, also receiving fellowships and commissions for the composition of new works. He re-emerged as a recording session leader in 2010 with the release of The Rub and Spare Change by the Michael Formanek Quartet on the ECM label; in addition to Formanek on bass (and as composer), the date featured saxophonist Berne, pianist Craig Taborn, and drummer Gerald Cleaver. Small Places, the second Formanek Quartet album on ECM, arrived in 2012; the album featured a lineup identical to the debut released two years previously. The 2010s also saw Formanek appear live with his aptly named Ensemble Kolossus, an 18-piece aggregation of musicians with whom he had collaborated over the years, including a new generation of players on the Brooklyn jazz scene. In early 2014 the Cuneiform label released the eponymous debut album by Thumbscrew, a collaborative trio comprising Formanek and two Brooklyn creative jazzers, guitarist Mary Halvorson and drummer Tomas Fujiwara, and the bassist appeared on another Cuneiform album in October of that year, guitarist Anthony Pirog's Palo Colorado Dream, also featuring drummer Ches Smith. Two years later, Formanek released The Distance -- his third album for ECM -- with Ensemble Kolossus, which incidentally also included Thumbscrew members Halvorson and Fujiwara in the lineup. And in May of that year, Thumbscrew's second album, Convallaria, was released by Cuneiform. At the end of 2017, the Cuneiform label announced it would be going on hiatus, but six months later the imprint re-emerged with a pair of Thumbscrew albums: Ours, comprising original compositions by the trio members; and Theirs, featuring covers of music penned by such jazz notables as Herbie Nichols, Benny Golson, Wayne Shorter, Jimmy Rowles, and Misha Mengelberg. Also in 2018, he delivered Time Like This, featuring his Elusion Quartet with alto saxophonist Tony Malaby, pianist Kris Davis, and drummer Ches Smith. Concurrent with a June 2018 Thumbscrew tour in support of Ours and Theirs, Formanek retired from his position at the Peabody Conservatory, planning to focus more of his future creative energies on performing and recording rather than the world of academia. One of his first projects following his departure from Peabody was 2019's Even Better, an inventive studio session featuring his Very Practical Trio with saxophonist Tim Berne and guitarist Halvorson. Formanek continued with a diverse array of recordings, including 2021's Imperfect Measures, a large-scale compositional work, and 2021's Dyads, a duo project with his son, pianist Peter Formanek. 2022 brought both Were We Where We Were, with his Drome Trio, and Other Zones, a quartet date with Tim Berne, Craig Taborn, and Gerald Cleaver. In 2023, he reunited his Elusion Quartet for As Things Do. With 2026's New Digs, he expanded Thumbscrew, augmenting Halvorson and Fujiwara with saxophonists John O'Gallagher and Chet Doxas, trumpeter João Almeida, and organist Alexander Hawkins. ~ Dave Lynch & Matt Collar, Rovi