Rent Romus, recognized as San Francisco's leading figure in jazz improvisation, first encountered music through piano lessons begun at age five. Jazz entered his focus only in high school, where he deepened his command of the idiom at the Stanford Jazz Workshop at Stanford University under such luminaries as Stan Getz, guitarist Bruce Forman, Dizzy Gillespie, Mel Martin, and Eddie Moore.
At 16 he conducted the 17-piece North Area Youth Jazz Ensemble (NAYJE), an undertaking that demonstrated his aptitude for assembling and leading sizable ensembles.
While enrolled at the University of California at Santa Cruz in the late '80s, Romus founded the acoustic jazz sextet Jazz on the Line, which issued such notable recordings as Jazz on the Line With Chico Freeman and In the Moment before adopting the name 2AM.
In 1993 he launched the alterna-jazz trio Lords of Outland with drummer James Zitro and Kash Killion, the former Sun Ra Arkestra cellist; the group delivered You'll Never Be the Same in 1995 and received national exposure on the BET program Jazz Central via its Jazz Discovery segment.
That year Romus mounted his first European tour, staging concerts in Denmark that showcased rising Copenhagen improvisers including pianist/trumpet player Jonas Müller. He revisited Denmark in 1996 for further performances with Müller under the banner of the Rent Romus Sound Cirkus and contributed to Bleedin' Heart, the initial U.S. release by French bluesman Paris Smith.
Romus recorded the 1997 album Adapt...or DIE! alongside renowned tenor saxophonist John Tchicai, best known for his associations with John Coltrane and Albert Ayler. His current ensemble, Blood Motions, features young Danish protégés Stefan Pasborg and bassist Jonas Westergaard. In addition to performance, Romus has conceived and produced multimedia presentations that integrate dance, theater, literature, and painting.
