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Mazz Swift : violin, vocals

Mazz Swift, a native New Yorker, began play­ing the vio­lin at age 6, study­ing with Elis­a­beth Small, Shirley Givens and Tim­o­thy Baker. She grad­u­ated from the High School of the Per­form­ing Arts, dur­ing which time she made her solo pub­lic per­for­mance debut on the stage of New York’s Alice Tully Hall, per­form­ing along­side mem­bers of the New York Phil­har­monic Orches­tra. She later attended The Juil­liard School of Music, study­ing under Stephen Clapp, but left in the mid­dle of her 3rd year in order to pur­sue a more organic approach to music making.

Mazz’s diverse musi­cal inter­ests have led her in many direc­tions; from clas­si­cal to rock to tra­di­tional folk music from around the world (spe­cial­iz­ing in Irish music) to hip hop and most recently jazz (free and com­posed). Con­se­quently, she has recorded and per­formed with a wide vari­ety of artists includ­ing Whit­ney Hous­ton, Perry Far­rell, Dee Snider, James “Blood” Ulmer, Ver­non Reid and DJ Logic (The Yohimbe Broth­ers), William Parker, Butch Mor­ris, many artists from the Black Rock Coali­tion, Kanye West, Com­mon and Jay-Z.

Mazz’s cur­rent projects include solo per­for­mances under the name of MazzMuse and writ­ing music for and play­ing in the string trio Hear in Now. She also spends much of her time in Budapest, mak­ing music with some of Hungary’s finest musi­cians in two projects: Budapest Bar and Fire + Fire (Gypsy Meets Black). She sits on the artis­tic board of Con Vivo (the Jer­sey City-based Cham­ber Music Soci­ety) and is also a proud per­form­ing mem­ber for that same orga­ni­za­tion. For more infor­ma­tion on her where­abouts and goings on, please fol­low Mazz atwww.MazzMuzik.com