Larry Chernicoff is a composer, improviser, and multi-instrumentalist, who combines his background in jazz and rock with classical elements and ‘orchestral’ instruments, creating a fresh and unusual sound.

Larry’s latest CD, October (Windy Planet Music, January 2004), features his ten-piece group, Windhorse. This ensemble has a classical chamber sound: oboe, clarinet, bassoon, French horn, harp, and strings - plus piano, vibraphone, and percussion. It’s an original blend, combining compositional detail, the spontaneity of jazz, and moments of meditative stillness and depth.

Larry also leads a straightforward jazz quintet, and Jazz + Jest, a unique collaboration between Larry’s group and Roger The Jester, a world-class mime/juggler/clown.

Larry attended the Berklee College of Music, and has been a member of the Creative Music Studio Orchestra in its several incarnations, over a period of 30 years, performing from Carnegie Hall to Colorado, with Karl Berger, Dave Holland, Anthony Braxton, Jack DeJohnette, the Art Ensemble of Chicago, Carla Bley, Frederic Rzewski, Sam Rivers, Ed Blackwell, Bob Moses, Peter Apfelbaum, Collin Walcott, Don Cherry, Lee Konitz, Oliver Lake, Wadada Leo Smith, Alan Ginsberg, and William Burroughs.

He has performed at Carnegie Hall, The Smithsonian Institution, Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, the Riverside Church, York University in Toronto, the Berlin Free University, the Naropa Institute, the Clark Art Institute, Berkshire Museum, Creative Music Studio, NYU, and many other venues in the U.S., Canada, and Europe. He studied at the Berklee College of Music in Boston and and the New School in New York.

Larry has also performed and recorded with guitarist Joel Harrison, jazz French horn master John Clark, avant-garde saxophonist Joe Giardullo, multi-instrumentalists Sonam Targee and Tom Schmidt, classical bassoonist Steve Walt, and award-winning New Age artist Benjy Wertheimer. He co-founded the Woodstock Music and Dance Ensemble, and has composed for dance, theater, and choir. Larry has recorded for Windy Planet, Muse/Art, Breeze, and Minds On Hold Records.

Larry has received a Jazz Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts, and performance grants from Meet the Composer, the New York State Council on the Arts, and the Massachusetts Arts Council.