Tomeka Reid Quartet - dance! skip! hop! To be released February 13, 2026 on Out Of Your Head Records

Pre save here

“She has quickly become a definitive figure on the 21st century jazz scene. As a composer, arranger, improviser, bandleader, and impresario she embodies jazz’s progressive ethos.” –JazzIz

The Tomeka Reid Quartet - dance! skip! hop! (OOYH 041) releases February 13 2026 (LP/CD/limited streaming) on Out Of Your Head Records, featuring the steady quartet of Tomeka Reid (cello) with Mary Halvorson (guitar), Jason Roebke (bass), and Tomas Fujiwara (drums). Soon after finishing these compositions in June 2025, Reid realized that much of the music made her want to dance. Inspired by the title of Josh Berman’s stellar A Dance and a Hop, as well as her tendency to skip in public, the title dance! skip! hop! was born. Reid has a deep connection to her family, and her album art and song titles often pay tribute to them, with the art for dance! skip! hop! featuring her great grandmother Francis Elizabeth Bean, her grandmother Estelle, and her great Aunt Cece throughout. Having visited the paternal side of her family in Wyoming for the first time in 2008, Reid was immediately struck by the house of her great grandparents, which her Aunt Cece and siblings fashioned into a kind of family museum full of photos of family gatherings from generations before. Because she didn’t have much connection to her biological father’s side of the family previously, she used this as a chance to connect as an adult, and strengthen her understanding of the family’s history. Using these photos is a way for Tomeka to show the importance of family in her work, and for the images to live on for future generations.

Both the compositions and improvising on dance! skip! hop! are as exceptional as you would expect from one of finest regular working bands in jazz and creative music. The quartet sounds more refined than ever, but also takes chances that only a band that has logged countless hours touring together can, with a playful spirit that the title suggests. They seem to one-up themselves with each successive album, and the release of dance! skip! hop! goes a long way to help Nate Chinen’s prediction that 2026 is “the year of Tomeka Reid” become a reality.

a (ways) for CC and Cece is a dedication to two very important people in Reid’s life. CC aka Clarence James, a regular at Fred Anderson’s Velvet Lounge and huge supporter of the Chicago scene, passed away in 2018. Reid says “Although he was not a practicing musician I learned so much from him…whenever I would leave his apartment he would say, “play loud, kid!” I miss him dearly.” Reid’s Great Aunt Cece, who just turned 90 this past summer, has also been a huge source of inspiration, especially in the past 5 years. Reid continues “I did not grow up knowing my family on my biological father’s side and really only got to know them over the past 20 years or so. During the pandemic, I took care of my grandmother, Estelle Crouch (Cece’s sister), and while it was one of the hardest experiences in my life thus far, it was also really beautiful and I now realize what a blessing and gift it was to look after her. Aunt Cece was by my side every step of the way. She really loved her big sister, who would have turned 100 this year.” Oo long! is named for a restaurant in Düsseldorf called Soba-An, which Reid visited when she was an artist-in-residence in Moers. “I was lucky to eat there maybe 3 times. It’s a very small space and if you didn’t get there right when they opened for lunch or dinner you wouldn’t get a table. Besides the handmade soba they had the most delicious oolong tea! I still crave it sometimes, so this song is named after that.” Reid continues “I like involving my husband when I can in my projects, so David named track #4 Under the Aurora Sky.” And the final track, Silver Spring Fig Tree, is a nod to Steve Feigenbaum of Cuneiform Records, the city where Reid first started playing cello, and where Feigenbaum lived and worked for many years.

Photo by Jasmine Kwong

Described as a “New Jazz Power Source” by the New York Times, cellist and composer Tomeka Reid has emerged as one of the most original, versatile, and curious musicians in Chicago’s bustling jazz and improvised music community over the last decade. Her distinctive melodic sensibility, always rooted in a strong sense of groove, has been featured in many distinguished ensembles over the years. Reid released her debut recording as a bandleader, Tomeka Reid Quartet, in 2015, a vibrant showcase for the cellist’s improvisational acumen as well as her dynamic arrangements and compositional ability. The quartet’s second album, Old New, released in Oct 2019 on Cuneiform Records, has been described as “fresh and transformative—its songs striking out in bold, lyrical directions with plenty of Reid’s singularly elegant yet energetic and sharp-edged bow work.” In Spring 2024, Reid released the quartet’s 3rd album, 3+3, which All About Jazz called “as transportingly good as jazz gets."

Reid has been a key member of ensembles led by legendary reedists like Anthony Braxton and Roscoe Mitchell, as well as a younger generation of visionaries including flutist Nicole Mitchell, and drummer Mike Reed. She is also a member of Tomas Fujiwara’s 7 Poets Trio, Myra Melford’s Fire and Water, Dave Douglas’s Gifts Quintet, Craig Taborn Trio and Angelika Niescier’s Beyond Dragons. Reid has two other main compositional outlets, the Tomeka Reid Stringtet and a septet that began as a tribute to Duke Ellington’s 125th birthday in 2024. In 2013, Reid launched the first Chicago Jazz String Summit, a three-day international festival of cutting edge string players held in Chicago. From 2019 to 2021 Tomeka Reid received a teaching appointment at Mills College as the Darius Milhaud chair in composition. In 2022, she was the Artist in Residence for the Moers Jazz Festival, a Visiting Roth Scholar and visiting professor at Dartmouth College from 2023-25 and she received her doctorate in music from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign in 2017. Tomeka is also a 2022 MacArthur Fellow and Herb Alpert awardee, a 2021 USA Fellow, and has received awards from the Foundation of the Contemporary Arts in 2019 and 3Arts in 2016.

The Tomeka Reid Quartet - dance! skip! hop!

Tomeka Reid - cello Jason Roebke - bass, cassette, Mary Halvorson - guitar, Tomas Fujiwara - drums