Mark Helias

Biography

Mark Helias is a renowned bassist and composer who has performed throughout the world for more than four decades. After his studies at Rutgers University (B.A. 1974) and The Yale School of Music (M.M. 1976), he began his international career in the Anthony Braxton Quartet. Up to the present time he has performed with a panoply of world class artists including: Edward Blackwell, Anthony Davis, Dewey Redman, Marcel Khalife, Abbey Lincoln, Oliver Lake, Andrew Cyrille, Marilyn Crispell, Julius Hemphill, Don Byron, Uri Caine, Roswell Rudd, Bobby Bradford, Barry Altschul, Ray Anderson, Jane Ira Bloom, Jason Moran, Nasheet Waits, Don Cherry, David Krakauer, Cecil Taylor, and Gerry Hemingway.

A prolific composer, Helias has written music for two feature films as well as chamber pieces and works for large ensemble and big band. His orchestra piece “Stochasm” was premiered by the American Composers Orchestra in June of 2011. He has produced many recordings for other artists including Ray Anderson, Tony Malaby, Bobby Previte, Jerome Harris, David Ades and Mark Dresser.

Fifteen albums of his music have been released since 1984, including “Split Image”, “The Current Set” (1987), “Desert Blue” (1989) “Attack The Future”, (1992) “Loopin’ the Cool” (1995), “Fictionary” (1998), “Come Ahead Back” (1998) “New School” (2001). “Verbs of Will” (2004), “Atomic Clock” (2006), “Strange Unison” (2008). “Explicit”(2011) and the latest on Intakt Records, “The Signal Maker”. In 2020 Mr. Helias released his first solo bass album “Available Light}, as well as a live trio album with Open Loose “The Third Proposition”, and a sextet recording entitled “Roof Rights. His trio, Open Loose with Tony Malaby and Tom Rainey, has become an archetypal improvising ensemble on the New York scene. He continues performing and recording with BassDrumBone, a forty-three year collaboration with Gerry Hemingway and Ray Anderson. Mr. Helias performs solo bass concerts and can also be heard in the innovative bass duo, “The Marks Brothers”, with fellow bassist Mark Dresser. He teaches privately and at SIM (School for Improvisational Music).

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