Coat Cooke steps down as artistic director of Vancouver’s influential New Orchestra Workshop Society this week, but Strong and Free, the concert that’s been arranged in his honour, is more of a chance to say thanks than goodbye. Cooke expects to continue working with NOW—perhaps as part of an effort to digitize and disseminate the improv collective’s 36-year archive of recordings and ephemera—and he says he’s thrilled that pianist Lisa Cay Miller is taking over the helm.

“With many companies, when the founding generation leaves they fold,” Cooke notes. “NOW, though, is in capable hands with a younger generation. I was worried that I’d be the last one holding the reins, so it’s great to know that I’m not.”

Four other members of NOW’s younger generation—trumpeter JP Carter, guitarist Chad MacQuarrie, bassist Tommy Babin, and drummer Skye Brooks—will join the saxophonist at his Western Front send-off on Friday (March 28), giving Cooke another reason to feel that the music he loves is in good hands.

“They’re such great players,” he says of his bandmates. “All of them are just terrific, terrific players, and becoming pillars in the scene on their own. I won’t compare myself to [legendary jazz mentor] Art Blakey, but I see the importance of operating in that kind of way.”