Biography
Wet Ink positions itself as "a collective of composers, performers, and improvisers dedicated to adventurous music-making." Eight musicians form its nucleus, operating collectively in what they describe as a "'band' atmosphere" while engaging both established artists and emerging or marginalized creators. Educational outreach forms a central part of their mission, reflected in residencies at American and European institutions. Their recorded output includes the 2024 release Andile Khumalo: Tracing Hollow Traces.
Saxophonist and composer Alex Mincek founded the group—sometimes called the Wet Ink Ensemble—in 1998 alongside musician and impresario Sam Hillmer. Both were then enrolled at the Manhattan School of Music and objected to what they termed an institutional monopoly on contemporary music-making in the U.S. at the time. They began organizing and presenting their own concerts, which gradually evolved into the ensemble. Although personnel shifted over the years, the lineup stabilized around eight co-directors who double as performers and composers: Erin Lesser on flutes, Mincek on saxophone, Ian Antonio on percussion, Eric Wubbels on piano, Josh Modney on violin, Mariel Roberts on cello, Kate Soper on voice, and Sam Pluta on electronics.
Their earliest documented appearance on disc occurred with the 2011 album George Lewis: Les Exercices Spirituels. Concerts have taken place throughout the New York metropolitan region, across the United States, and abroad, earning favorable coverage in The New York Times, The New Yorker, and the Chicago Reader. Programs have featured portrait concerts devoted to Anthony Braxton, Mathias Spahlinger, and members of Chicago’s AACM collective. Additional collaborators have included Ingrid Laubrock, Peter Evans, Darius Jones, and Katherine Young, alongside frequent performances of works by the ensemble’s own composers Mincek, Pluta, Soper, and Wubbels. A collection of Mincek’s music appeared on Carrier Records in 2020; subsequent projects were issued on Carrier, Huddersfield Contemporary Records, and Telegraph Harp before the move to New Focus Recordings for the 2024 Khumalo album. Residencies have been held at Duke University, Columbia University, the Walden School, and London’s Royal Academy of Music.
Saxophonist and composer Alex Mincek founded the group—sometimes called the Wet Ink Ensemble—in 1998 alongside musician and impresario Sam Hillmer. Both were then enrolled at the Manhattan School of Music and objected to what they termed an institutional monopoly on contemporary music-making in the U.S. at the time. They began organizing and presenting their own concerts, which gradually evolved into the ensemble. Although personnel shifted over the years, the lineup stabilized around eight co-directors who double as performers and composers: Erin Lesser on flutes, Mincek on saxophone, Ian Antonio on percussion, Eric Wubbels on piano, Josh Modney on violin, Mariel Roberts on cello, Kate Soper on voice, and Sam Pluta on electronics.
Their earliest documented appearance on disc occurred with the 2011 album George Lewis: Les Exercices Spirituels. Concerts have taken place throughout the New York metropolitan region, across the United States, and abroad, earning favorable coverage in The New York Times, The New Yorker, and the Chicago Reader. Programs have featured portrait concerts devoted to Anthony Braxton, Mathias Spahlinger, and members of Chicago’s AACM collective. Additional collaborators have included Ingrid Laubrock, Peter Evans, Darius Jones, and Katherine Young, alongside frequent performances of works by the ensemble’s own composers Mincek, Pluta, Soper, and Wubbels. A collection of Mincek’s music appeared on Carrier Records in 2020; subsequent projects were issued on Carrier, Huddersfield Contemporary Records, and Telegraph Harp before the move to New Focus Recordings for the 2024 Khumalo album. Residencies have been held at Duke University, Columbia University, the Walden School, and London’s Royal Academy of Music.
Albums
