A Container is improvised but committed to rhythm. A Container play some songs you know and some we don’t. A Container is by definition “One who, or that which, contains; particularly, an artifactual object that is designed to contain some fluid or solid material, object or objects, especially for convenience in transporting the contained objects.”

A Container is:

JT Bates - Drums
Cody McKinney - Bass
Bryan Murray - Saxophone
Jeremy Ylvisaker - Guitar

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Growing up in a musical family gave JT Bates an early start in sound and rhythmic exploration. He set on the path to becoming a working musician while playing in his father’s big band as a teen. Over the years, he remained steeped in the improvised music scene, both as a performer and presenter. In 2015, he produced and released his first solo album, Open Relationships (Totally Gross National Product), and in 2021, he released an album called Not Other Stuff. As a session drummer, Bates has appeared on Grammy record of the year, Folklore (Taylor Swift), and Swift’s follow-up album, Evermore. He has also performed on the Grammy-nominated album s/t (Bonny Light Horseman) and critically acclaimed records by Bon Iver, Big Red Machine, Cassandra Jenkins, The National, Maya Hawke, and Ed Sheeran.

Cody McKinney is a bassist, composer, improviser, and sound artist residing in the Twin Cities. He has been actively composing, recording, and performing since the mid-1990s. Some of McKinney’s recent works have been recorded by his contemporary trio, Bloodline.

After 20 years of living, studying, and performing in the New York music scene, Bryan Murray relocated to Minnesota with his family in 2022. While in New York, Murray led an “avant country” band called Bryan and the Haggards that focused on the songwriting of country music legend Merle Haggard. The band’s two albums on Hot Cup Records and one with Eugene Chadbourne on Northern Spy Records have received much praise. The New York Times said, “…their debut is satisfying as both a commentary on Mr. Haggard’s music and a dispatch from the current jazz frontier.” The Boston Globe called the debut “The Biggest Surprise Jazz Album,” and The Wire rated it as one of the top 10 jazz albums of the year. Murray has also been a regular sideman on other projects—including Moppa Elliott’s Unspeakable Garbage and Jon Lundbom’s Big Five Chord—and joined the “Love This Giant” tour with David Byrne and St. Vincent. His latest musical projects use a modified saxophone of his own creation and are recorded under the pseudonym Balto Exclamationpoint.

Jeremy Ylvisaker is a multi-instrumentalist, composer, producer, teacher, and visual artist whose music and images are influenced by decades of wildly disparate collaborations with artists both popular (e.g., Laufey, Bon Iver, Suki Waterhouse, Sara Bareilles, Andrew Bird, Bruce Hornsby) and, more often, underground. These friendships are reflected in many solo recordings; with his trio Alpha Consumer; in his multimedia series Nights for All Time; in his contributions to soundtracks such as Aggregate States of Matters (MoMA), Reframed: Forgotten Film Remembered (Walker Art Center), and Macbeth on Broadway; and in an improvised score alongside Merce Cunningham Dance Company. Some of his favorite art is collaborations between taggers, the people who paint over their tag, and the people who mark where utilities are.