Bob Downes (born 22 July 1937 in Plymouth) is an English avant-garde jazz flautist and saxophonist. He is probably best known for his work with musicians such as Mike Westbrook, and for leading his own group since 1968, the Open Music Trio who released a series of LPs on Downes' own Openian record label.

On Diversions Downes played concert, alto & chinese bamboo flutes, and tenor sax. Five of the eight pieces are trios with double bass (Barry Guy and Jeff Clyne) and drums (Denis Smith). The other three pieces are solos: on "Samurai" Downes played concert and alto flutes into a piano with the sustain pedal pressed down to give a tuned resonance, and on "The Dream" a slow disjunct melody reminiscent of the interwar Viennese school on concert flute over an eerie white noise rich VCS3 synthesiser soundscape played by Laurie Baker. The trios have the texture of (then) modern jazz, but the improvisation is melodic rather than harmonic and both the flute and (particularly Barry Guy's) double bass veer off into European Classical avant garde territory. In 2007 Diversions was re-released by Vocalion.