The tuba player Mikas Kurtinaitis has already taken to the Vilnius Jazz stage several times. He has appeared in several programmes of the Improdimensija Orchestra, and last year his duo with flutist Salomėja Kalvelytė won a special prize for the Best Standard Improvisation at the VJYP competition. In the first round of this year’s competition, he was voted the Best Instrumentalist.

This year Mikas decided to prepare a solo programme for the competition. He is becoming more and more adventurous as a soloist on the contemporary and improvised music scene, recently showcasing his latest experiments in the Improdimensija concert series. The tuba player also experiments in a duo with flutist S. Kalvelytė and collaborates with many creative peers.

After graduating from the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre with a degree in contemporary music and free improvisation, Kurtinaitis began to explore the possibilities of expanding the sound of the tuba. However, his interests are much broader. Mikas also plays in the klezmer and Balkan music collective Rakija Klezmer Orkestar and is very keen on learning about the musical heritage of Eastern Europe and the Middle East.