Roscoe Mitchell

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Roscoe Mitchell (b. August 3, 1940 in Chicago, Illinois) is an African-American composer and jazz saxophonist.

Mitchell studied with Muhal Richard Abrams and played in his Experimental Band, thus becoming one of the first members of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM). The first AACM album to be released was Sound by Mitchell's sextet. Sound, in contrast to the predominantly fast paced screaming sessions of the jazz avant-garde, was an exploration of silence and made great use of both traditionally non-jazz instruments but also so-called "little instruments": hand percussion, bicycle horns and home-made instruments.Jazz musician David Sanborn was taught by him.

He is the founder of the Creative Arts Collective, an organization similar in intent to the AACM. Mitchell is a cofounder of The Art Ensemble of Chicago.