Conductors featured regularly on Big Band Special included American jazz trombonist Jiggs Whigham, leading British arrangers Mark Nightingale and Steve Sidwell, the BBC Big Band's baritone saxophonist Jay Craig and Jöerg Achim Keller.
CUJO has performed in numerous professional venues in the UK on national tours including the Bull's Head in Barnes, won gold awards in UK-wide big band competitions and has collaborated with world-famous musicians, composers and arrangers such as Laurence Cottle (2013), Stan Sulzmann (2012), Steve Waterman (2010), Issie Barratt and Mike Gibbs (2009), and Mark Nightingale (2007).
Among those with whom Nightingale has played with are John Dankworth, Cleo Laine, Urbie Green, Carl Fontana, Jiggs Whigham, Clark Terry, Slide Hampton, Thilo Berg, Alan Barnes, Bill Holman, Claire Martin, John Wilson (conductor), Clark Tracey, and Stan Tracey.
Mark Twain | Florence Nightingale | Mark | Mark Wahlberg | Mark Knopfler | Mark Zuckerberg | Mark Rothko | Mark Antony | Mark the Evangelist | Gospel of Mark | Mark Ronson | Mark Spitz | Mark Foley | Mark Murphy (singer) | Mark Murphy | Mark McGwire | Mark Hamill | Deutsche Mark | Mark Taper Forum | Mark Millar | Mark Lewisohn | Mark Kermode | A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square (song) | Mark Lanegan | A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square | Mark Waugh | Mark Rydell | Mark Goodson | Mark Owen | Mark Mothersbaugh |
He has led his own ensembles since the late 1980s; in these combos he has played with Django Bates, Iain Ballamy, Guy Barker, Jamie Talbot, Mark Nightingale, Dave O'Higgins, Nigel Hitchcock, Gerard Presencer, Mornington Lockett, Jean Toussaint, Simon Allen, Zoe Rahman and Alan Barnes.
Frode Kjekstad (born 23 November 1974 in Lier, Norway) is a Norwegian jazz musician (guitar), married to jazz singer Aina Fridén, and known from cooperations and recordings with jazz musicians like Lonnie Smith, Eric Alexander, Frank Foster, Johnny Griffin, Don Menza, Jim Morrison, Mark Nightingale, Claire Martin, Deborah Brown, and Wendell Brunious.