Dutch pianist Mike del Ferro is a sought-after composer, pianist and arranger who writes and performs in an impressive array of musical genres. He has travelled the world extensively, searching for collaborations with musicians from cultures quite different to his own, and the musical results have been eye-opening, building musical bridges between cultures not normally within reach of each other. He has managed to combine elements of the revered canons of Western music interspersed with the audacity of jazz improvisation, and paying tribute to the ancient structures of Asian, South American and African traditional songs.

A native of Amsterdam, he started his career studying classical piano at the age of nine and, after falling in love with jazz, he focused his studies on jazz and received a Masters of Music in Contemporary Music from the Amsterdam Conservatory. His father was opera singer Leonard del Ferro (1921-1992), who sang and recorded with Maria Callas, and his childhood was thus filled with music of the highest order. "My earliest childhood memories are of my father singing - singing at concerts, at home, in restaurants, with friends, just Belcanto (which means beautiful singing) everywhere. It was inevitable with this background, that I should want to make music and had my first classical piano lessons at the age of nine. As I became older I discovered the freedom of Jazz and Contemporary Music, and developed a passion for playing the great Jazz standards. Lots of these standards originate from Broadway musicals and have always been a source of inspiration for Jazz musicians."

In 1989 he won First Prize at the Rotterdam Jazz Piano Competition, the Soloist Prize at the Europe Jazz Contest in Brussels, and First Prize at the Karlovy Vary Jazz contest and from 1993-1996 studied composition and arrangment with Bob Brookmeyer at the Musikhochschule in Cologne, Germany. In 1995 Mike was appointed to the faculty of the Royal Conservatory in Gent, Belgium where he taught jazz piano until 1997. His reputation as a soloist, accompanist, composer and arranger has led to worldwide performances, recordings and tours with musicians such as Toots Thielemans, Jack DeJohnette, Oscar Castro Neves, Deborah Brown, Scott Hamilton, Richard Galliano, Candy Dulfer, Trijntje Oosterhuis, Badi Assad, Fernanda Porto, Stian Carstensen and many others. He has also recorded dozens of albums in many different genres from Dixieland to Salsa and has arranged music for animation for Danish animator and Oscar winner, Børge Ring. He is the Director of Jazz Programs for American Voices, where he travels the world performing in countries ranging from Latvia, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan to Myanmar, Indonesia, Rwanda, Bolivia and Vietnam. In addition, he coordinates artistic programming for American Voices' jazz festivals worldwide.

Mike del Ferro goes by Mark Twain’s dictum - “Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime” – and his music reflects the array of influences that he has picked up in some of the most exotic places in the world. He performed in 22 countries in 2007, and an indication of the diversity of his touring schedule is that in the next couple of months he will be playing in Japan, Peru, Saudi Arabia, Russia, Brazil, South Africa, Malaysia, Belgium, Nicaragua, the US, Indonesia, Bolivia, The Netherlands, Argentina and Vietnam!

del Ferro visits South Africa regularly, sometimes to perform and sometimes just to be in a country that is close to his heart. He taught at the Standard Bank National Youth Jazz Festival 2008 and performed in the Standard Bank Jazz Festival, Grahamstown in July 2008 for the first time. His eclectic style and range of influences suited this cosmopolitan festival and he endeared himself to the young students gathered there, as well as to the professional musicians from around the world who were performing. A hallmark of the jazz in Grahamstown is the unique international collaborations that emerge, with a wonderful mix of musicians from around the world gathered at the festival, interacting with top South African musicians.

Mike del Ferro took part in three particularly notable collaborations in Grahamstown in 2008. He played piano in the United Nations of Grahamstown, a mix of five musicians from different countries, each bringing their own compositions and reflecting their national style. Aside from the Dutch pianist, del Ferro, there was Swedish saxophonist Per Thornberg, Australian trombonist Adrian Mears, now resident in Switzerland, South African bassist Marc Duby, recently appointed Professor of Music at Rhodes University and Carl Allen (drums) from New York, Artistic Director of the Juilliard School of Music, and with performance collaborations that include US jazz greats like Freddie Hubbard, J J Johnson, Joe Henderson, Herbie Hancock and Phil Woods. Mike also collaborated with saxophonist Shannon Mowday, with whom he has often worked, here and in Europe, for a show entitled Universal Explorations. They were joined by London saxophonist Dave O’Higgins and the South African rhythm section of Marc Duby (bass) and Kesivan Naidoo (drums).

One of the undoubted highlights of the 2008 Standard Bank Jazz Festival in Grahamstown was his meeting with the great African diva Sibongile Khumalo, in a performance entitled Opera Meets Jazz. Khumalo, South Africa’s best-known opera singer, grew up in a household where Classical music mingled with traditional African songs. Her father, a music professor, instilled a love for both genres and at an early age she began formal lessons and after great success as an opera singer she glided spectacularly into jazz in the 1990s. On the other side of the world, Dutch master pianist del Ferro grew up in a house where his father was one of the leading opera singers in Europe and he also began music lessons early. Jazz soon drew him too. Both Khumalo and del Ferro have an impressive list of international performances and collaborations, but one in particular links them – drummer Jack DeJohnette, with whom both have independently performed. He recommended that they perform together, so Grahamstown is where the great opera-jazz meeting took place. Added to the mix was Shannon Mowday (sax), Torbjörn Zetterberg (bass) from Sweden and Norwegian Håkon Johansen (drums), and the performance exceeded expectations spectacularly.

For more information on Mike del Ferro, his itinerary and where to find his music, see www.mikedelferro.com