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January/February 2019 – upcoming classical gigs around Britain and Ireland – Nonclassical’s Battle of the Bands (23rd January); Scordatura’s Clara Schumann evening (3rd February); Gyða Valtýsdóttir’s ‘Epicycle’ tour (29th January to 3rd February)

Nonclassical open their year with their annual Battle of the Bands at their live homebase in Hackney’s Victoria performance pub. Six competitors will be duking it out for industry attention and more Nonclassical gig opportunities. As usual, they’ve been chosen from the permeable space where contemporary classical touches on other musical forms, on other arts and on current concerns.

There will be two solo performers. Woodwind specialist James Hurst will be swapping between alto saxophone and alto recorder to perform his own ‘The Descent of Ishtar To The Underworld’, a guided, Bronze Age-inspired improvisation. Reylon Yount, a San Franciscan Chinese-American yangqin player and member of Yo-Yo Ma’s Silk Road Ensemble, will be performing the diasporan-influenced sound exploration ‘Rituals and Resonances for Solo Yangqin’ by Chinese-British composer Alex Ho, which “attempts to engage with the paradoxical sense of nostalgia one may feel for a place one did not grow up in” via “an exploration of the relationship between sound and its resonance.”

Three collectives are also competing. Chamber ensemble Scordatura Women’s Music Collective champion and perform the work of female composers, both living and dead: on this occasion, they’ll be performing ‘Las Sombras de los Apus’ by Gabriela Lena Frank, a cello quartet in which each instrument plays in a different tuning. The recently-formed New Music group 4|12 Collective will be playing James Saunders’ Instruments with Recordings (with a lineup of viola player Toby Cook, flautist Epsie Thompson, accordionist Giancarlo Palena, bassoonist Olivia Palmer-Baker, trombonist Benny Vernon and tuba player Stuart Beard).

Rita Says & The Jerico Orchestra (performing Paragraph 7 of ‘The Great Learning’ by Cornelius Cardew) have been around a little longer: over the past decade, they’ve been working at “defin(ing) a connection between fine art performance practise and the history of contemporary music”, exploring a spontaneous blend of physical action and visual interaction to create and conduct pieces.

Finally, there’s composer/performer and Filthy Lucre co-founder Joe Bates, who pitches his camp on the faultline between contemporary classical music and avant-rock, hip hop and electronics; and whose artistic interests include “desire at a remove” and “the decline of classical music’s social prestige and the possibilities for its future.” His music blends contemporary classical structures and instrumentation options with “intense, still, driven riffs” and harmonies from rock and other pop forms. On this occasion, he’ll be playing pieces from his microtonal synthesiser suite/EP ‘Flim Flam’.

https://soundcloud.com/joseph_bates/6-furl-1?in=joseph_bates/sets/flim-flam-ep

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If you’re sympathetic to Scordatura’s role as feminist music historians and curators, you might like to know that they’re popping up again in Abingdon, Oxfordshire in early February – as part of the Abbey Chamber Concerts series.

Their 3rd February gig, titled as “Celebrating Clara” (and utilising a shifting duo/trio/quartet formation of clarinettist Poppy Beddoe, violinist Claudia Fuller, cellist Rachel Watson and pianist Thomas Ang) ostensibly showcases Clara Schumann, the similarly talented but undervalued composer-pianist married to Robert Schumann. They’ll be playing one Schumann piece – the Piano Trio in G minor – and possibly some of her clarinet work, but the remaining programme slots are given over to the work of other female composers. Contemporary composer Cecilia McDowall’s chamber piece ‘Cavatina at Midnight’ is followed by the Victorian ‘Piano Suite in E major’ by Clara Schumann’s contemporary Ethel Smyth.

The last piece is by Fanny Hensel ( ‘Fantasia for Cello and Piano’) a.ka. Fanny Mendelssohn, whose life was a sometimes-uncomfortable reiterating mirror of Clara’s. Both were similarly talented intimates of established composers (one a wife, the other a sister); both had surprisingly encouraging husbands; both were also tutored and driven by demanding fathers who established excellence in them. Both, too, were ultimately constrained as composers by the discouragements and domestic responsibilities forced upon women of their times, with the men in their families often acting with a frustrating mixture of systematic positive pressure and patriarchal forbiddings. (Felix Mendelssohn, for instance, was a devoted, championing brother who found that he drew the line at Fanny entering the canon of published composers.)

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Overlapping these two concerts is a British/Irish mini-tour by Gyða Valtýsdóttir – still known as the former cellist for Iceland experimental pop band Múm even though she only played on two of their albums and has been out of the band for sixteen years.

Having immediately returned, post-Múm, to her classical roots (formally studying, graduating and applying herself to classical cello) Gyða’s spent the time since then in the genre-stepping world of the modern post-classical musician. Outside of the classical gigs, rent-paying but artistically respectable engagements adding stringwork to records or tours by Sigur Ros’ Jónsi, Damien Rice and Colin Stetson have alternated with assorted film, dance, theatre and installation music around the world, as well as bouts of free improvisation gigs. Allied with her twin sister and ex-Múm bandmate Kristín Anna, Gyða also added a “reciprocal twin” component to Aaron and Bryce Dessner’s 2015 song cycle ‘Forever Love’, conceived and delivered with performance artists Ragnar Kjartansson.

Although Gyða’s latest personal release (last year’s ‘Evolution’) features her own compositions and a return to her Múm-era multi-instrumentalism – and although some of those songs will get an airing – this tour focusses mostly on her 2017 solo debut ‘Epicycle‘, a two-millennia-spanning exercise in musical commonality and reconfiguration originally intended as “a gift for friends” on which Schubert, Schumann and Messiaen rub shoulders with Harry Partsch, George Crumb, Hildegard von Bingen and the nineteen-hundred year old Seikilos Epitaph. The album was an Icelandic smash hit and a talking point elsewhere: a classical debut recorded with the immediacy of a jazz record and with a broad-minded disregard for purity, bringing in upfront studio processing techniques and stylings/instrumental responses from other traditions from jazz to ancient folk to experimental post-rock.

On tour, she’s performing with her Epicycle trio, also featuring multi-instrumentalist Shahzad Ismaily (on guitar, synthesizer, percussion and anything else which needs playing) and drummer Julian Sartorius, both of whom played on the record.

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Dates:

Nonclassical presents:
Nonclassical: Battle of the Bands
The Victoria, 451 Queensbridge Road, E8 3AS London, United Kingdom
Wednesday 23rd January 2019, 8.00pm – information here, here and here

Abbey Chamber Concerts present:
Scordatura: Women’s Music Collective: ‘Celebrating Clara’
St Nicolas’ Church, Market Place, Abingdon-on-Thames, Oxfordshire OX14 3HF
Sunday 3rd February 2019, 3.00pm – information here, here and here

Gyða Valtýsdóttir – ‘Epicycle’ tour:

Norwich Arts Centre, 51 St. Benedicts Street, Norwich, NR2 4PG, England, Tuesday 29th January 2019, 8.00pm – information here, here and here
Kings Place, 90 York Way, Kings Cross, London, N1 9AG, England, Wednesday 30th January 2019, 7.30pm – information here and here
The Metropolitan Arts Centre, 10 Exchange St West, Belfast, BT1 2NJ, Northern Ireland, Thursday 31st January 2019 – no further information
Dublin Unitarian Church, 112 Saint Stephen’s Green, Dublin, D02 YP23, Ireland, Friday 1st February 2019, 8.00pm – information here and here
Summerhall, 1 Summerhall, Edinburgh, EH9 1PL, Scotland, Sunday 3rd February 2019, 8.00pm – information here and here

Tags: 4|12 Collective, Abingdon (England), Alex Ho, Belfast (Northern Ireland), Benny Vernon, Cecilia McDowall, Clara Schumann, Claudia Fuller, Cornelius Cardew, Dublin (Ireland), Edinburgh (Scotland), Epsie Thompson, Ethel Smyth, Fanny Hensel (Fanny Mendelssohn), Gabriela Lena Frank, George Crumb, Giancarlo Palena, Gyða Valtýsdóttir, Harry Partsch, Hildegard von Bingen, Iceland, James Hurst, James Saunders, Joe Bates, Julian Pastorius, listening to women, London (England), múm, Nonclassical (event/promoter/record label), Norwich (England), Olivia Palmer-Baker, Olivier Messiaen, Poppy Beddoe, Rachel Watson, Ragnar Kjartansson, Reylon Yount, Rita Says & The Jerico Orchestra, Robert Schumann, Scordatura Women's Music Collective, Sergei Prokofiev, Shahzad Ismaily, Stuart Beard, Thomas Ang, Toby Cook, women of heart and mind

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Categories 2019, 20th century classical music, 21st century classical music, acoustic music, chamber music, classical (Western art music), classical fusion, cover versions, DIY music, electro-acoustic music, experimental music, improvisation, instrumental music, New Music, previews, Romantic music

January 2019 – upcoming London classical gigs – Marin Allsop and the LPO bring a batch of premieres to ‘Here and Now’ (16th January); Philip Thomas, Richard Craig and Damien Harron perform Morton Feldman’s ‘Crippled Symmetry’ (22nd January); Phaedra Ensemble and friends play Meredith Monk, Caroline Shaw, Jamie Hamilton and Fred Thomas (29th January)

11 Jan

Marin Allsop, 2018

As well as interlocking with the Southbank’s SoundState festival, next Thursday’s ‘Here and Now’ concert, performed by the London Philharmonic Orchestra and conducted by Marin Allsop, is part of the orchestra’s year-long ‘Isle of Noises’ series featuring three hundred and thirty years worth of “landmark classics inspired by the British Isles.”

While other concerts in the series are likely to feature Handel, Purcell, Vaughan Williams and other longstanding canon composers influenced (in some cases) by their migration to the islands or (in others) by their responses to its landscapes, this early-stages concert is packed with – read, entirely composed of – premieres of brand new pieces. On offer are the world premieres of Arne Gieshoff’s ‘Burr’, Helen Grime’s ‘Percussion Concerto’ (with Colin Currie as soloist) and Anders Hillborg’s new twenty-minute concerto-for-orchestra ‘Sound Atlas’ (also including a battery of percussion, from the more familiar timpani and tubular bells to Chinese opera gong, vibraslap and paint tin).

In addition, there’s the British premiere of Estonian composer Erkki-Sven Tüür’s ‘Solastalgia for piccolo and orchestra’ (featuring piccoloist Stewart McIlwham). There’s also the European premiere of Louis Andriessen’s ‘Agamemnon’, a kind of actorless, wordless instrumental opera composed by Andriessen for his own 80th birthday celebration concerts in New York last autumn, and described by him as “a war-like piece, full of fast music and nervous terror” constructed (as mythology usually is) by a babble of competing voices. Here’s a little snatch of it from the New York rehearsals…

Earlier in the evening, Marin Allsop will provide a free “Behind the Baton” discussion on the evening’s music and on her thoughts on classical music’s future.

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Over the next couple of weeks, there are two interesting free concerts in the City, University of London Concert Series at the City campus in Finsbury.

Morton Feldman

The first, on the evening of the 22nd, is a performance of Morton Feldman’s ‘Crippled Symmetry’ by percussionist Damien Harron, flautist Richard Craig and Philip Thomas on piano and celesta. One of the composer’s late works (from 1983), it’s “a haunting exploration of stillness, tonal and temporal ambiguities, and musical patterning.” As presented to players, it’s a slightly disassociated triple-part score: each individual part fully notated but deliberately not synchronized with the others (leading to fascinating opportunities for uncertainty and chance).

As with many Feldman pieces, ‘Crippled Symmetry’ is also a long, attenuated listening challenge, lasting an entire hour-and-a-half. Here’s the 1991 version recorded by Eberhard Blum, Jan Williams and Nils Vigeland from Feldman’s original ensemble:

https://youtu.be/KAbTzolXjNs

The second concert – a week later on the 29th – features string-quartet-plus-collaborators Phaedra Ensemble. In this case, they’re performing a programme of New York- or London-composed string-based pieces inspired by the human voice.

From the American side, Roomful Of Teeth member, composer-violinist and sometime hip hop collaborator Caroline Shaw provides 2011’s ‘Entr’acte’: in part, a humorous deconstruction and reconstruction of Haydn in which his sublime classical-era tone shifts struggle to place and reassert themselves within the unruliness of twenty-first century music.

In parallel, NYC loft music veteran and intuitive voice music doyen Meredith Monk contributes her 2005 piece String Songs. Originally premiered in London by the Kronos Quartet almost exactly thirteen years ago, it’s the piece which she transposed and translated her idiosyncratic and individual vocal ideas into string quartet context for the first time. Examples below:

The first of the pieces from the British side – the crinkling, conversational ‘Taking a nap, I pound the rice’ (with its quinpartite nods to the compositions and thoughts of composers from the aforementioned Feldman and John Cage to Anton Webern and Thelonious Monk, and of transformative British nature writer/‘Peregrine’ author J.A. Baker – comes from Fred Thomas, one of F-IRE Collective’s multi-instrumentalist composers. Fred himself joins Phaedra for the piece on prepared piano, accompanied by percussionist Maurizio Ravalico. As with the previous performance of the piece – listen below – narration is provided on tape by rising black British actress Ronke Adekoleujo.

The last piece, ‘Remainder for vocalising string quartet’ is a world premiere from composer/mixed-media artist/Phaedra co-director Jamie Hamilton. It explores “the many techniques that were developed with him incorporating speech, singing and vocalisations with instrumental playing” and continues to pursue his interest in how humans use sound as a measuring medium.

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Dates:

London Philharmonic Orchestra presents:
London Philharmonic Orchestra/Marin Alsop: ‘Here and Now: Isle of Noises’
Royal Festival Hall, Southbank Centre, Belvedere Road, Waterloo, London, SE1 8XX, England
Wednesday 16th January 2019, 7.30pm – information here (‘Behind the Baton’ talk info here)

City, University of London Concert Series presents:
Philip Thomas + Richard Craig + Damien Harron perform Morton Feldman: Crippled Symmetry
Performance Space @ City, University of London, College Building, St John Street, Finsbury, London, EC1V 4PB, England
Tuesday 22nd January 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here

City, University of London Concert Series presents:
Phaedra Ensemble: Monk, Shaw, Hamilton, Thomas
Performance Space @ City, University of London, College Building, St John Street, Finsbury, London, EC1V 4PB, England
Tuesday 29th January 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here

Tags: Anders Hillborg, Anton Webern, Arne Gieshoff, Caroline Shaw, Colin Currie, Damien Harron, Eberhard Blum, Erkki-Sven Tüür, F-IRE Collective, Franz Joseph Haydn, Fred Thomas, Helen Grime, J.A. Baker, Jamie Hamilton, Jan Williams, John Cage, listening to women, London (England), London Philharmonic Orchestra, Louis Andriessen, Marin Allsop, Maurizio Ravalico, Meredith Monk, Morton Feldman, New York City (USA), Nils Vigeland, Phaedra Ensemble, Philip Thomas, prepared piano music, Richard Craig, Ronke Adekoleujo, Roomful Of Teeth, Stewart McIlwham, string quartet music, Thelonious Monk, women of heart and mind

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Categories 2019, 20th century classical music, 21st century classical music, acoustic music, chamber music, classical (Western art music), electro-acoustic music, experimental music, festivals, instrumental music, music drama, New Music, orchestral music, previews, spoken word

January 2019 – upcoming London jazz gigs – the Sound of 2019 with Chelsea Carmichael, Nihilism and Vertaal (9th January); Alexandra Ridout in the first part of the next installment of Jazz Herstory (17th January); Steam Down invite you to be on their debut album (26th January)

6 Jan

On 9th January, tenor saxophonist Chelsea Carmichael (from SEED Ensemble/NYJO Jazz Messengers) jumps into a bigger spotlight at the Jazz Cafe, as part of Tastemakers Jazz’s ‘Sound of 2019’ evening. At twenty-five, the time’s right for her to step out; with recent apprenticeships with Terence Blanchard, Courtney Pine, and Etienne Charles (as well as work with Indo-jazz fusioneer Arun Ghosh and as right-hand reedswoman for SEED’s Cassie Kinoshi) helping to shape whatever she does now. This will apparently be the debut of her first project under her own name: so new that I don’t know who else is in it yet, nor anything bar the fact that it’ll be influenced by Chelsea’s “love of groove and intricate rhythms”, and probably isn’t the Mingus-flavoured quintet she brought to the City Beerfest last summer.

Meanwhile, here’s Chelsea blowing tenor with SEED…

In the middle of the bill is electro-acoustic quintet Nihilism – a tuneful cluster of post-bop hip hop, Grapelli hot jazz, funk, grime and Mahavishnu fusion flickering around a median age of twenty. At the core of it (but not restricting it) is a classic acoustic sound revitalised by latterday British dance music, bedrocked by soprano saxophonist Shango Ijishakin, Berklee-trained pianist Lorenz Okello-Osengor and drummer Benjamin Appiah. Lorenz also dabbles in synths, while bassist Christopher Luu juggles his time between acoustic upright and a batch of electronic devices. Their debut EP ‘Exposition’ surfaced in November 2018, a couple of years after they’d formed and honed themselves with frequent gigging.

Despite Lorenz’ Berklee crown, Nihilism’s true secret weapon appears to be their electric violinist and occasional singer/rapper Saskia Horton, a twenty-one-year-old ball of energy and onetime fiddler for FKA Twigs. With an extra double life in theatre and dance, she choreographs and performs in a variety of street and dance-club styles (including krumping and waacking), and brings an assertive physicality to the band’s music every time she bows a string.

Toting a “spiritual jazz-funk” tag, Vertaal are an open-socketed duo (keyboard player Theo Howarth and drummer Ajit Gill) perpetually plugging in a rich turnover of guest players. Here’s a taste of them, with the core duo augmented on that occasion by bassist Warren Woodcraft, saxophonist Loren Hignell and percussionist Simon Todd. Who knows who’ll be joining Ajit and Theo on the night?

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On 17th January, Jazz Herstory resume their staging of female-led jazz concerts over at Poplar Union. It kicks off this year with a performance by trumpeter and bandleader Alexandra Ridout – still only nineteen, but already packing awards for BBC Young Musician of the Year (in 2016) and as 2017 runner-up rising star in the Jazz Awards, as well as hirings by Clarke Tracy and Dave Holland and time spent with her two-generation family jazz band The Ridouts.

She’s bringing along a quintet of fellow teenagers. Pianist Noah Stoneman and guitarist Miles Mindlin are each a fresh-faced seventeen, while bassist Freddie Jensen and drummer Luca Caruso are both nineteen: fresh-faced they may be, but they have equal facility in classic swing, contemporary post-bop, funk and balladry. (Expect an audience with its fair share of middle-aged jazzers with mingled expressions of inspiration, chagrin and vague – or in some case, actual – parental pride.)

Here’s the quintet at work – admittedly with a Stoneman original rather than the sheaf of Ridout tunes which will be played on the night. Also attached is Alexandra’s Young Musician performance from three years ago.

Jazz HerStory continues over the next couple of months with performances by Rosie Turton and Ms. Maurice, but more on that nearer to February…

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On the 26th, interactively-minded Deptford crew Steam Down have invited everyone down to the Albany to help them record their first album. It’s going to be a live one, caught in full audio-visual with attendees and responders on an equal footing to the band. “There is no audience, we are all the music, everyone’s participation matters. The collective’s sessions are a co-creative experience between the audience and musicians. A mutual exchange of energy and vibes between the groovers and movers, the band and the crowd.”

All of this is in keeping with Steam Down’s African-inspired collective ethos. One-and-a-half years old now, the project was founded by saxophonist and multi-instrumentalist Ahnanse and they’ve already reached out beyond their south London base to light up gigs in Berlin, Paris, Amsterdam, Antwerp and Oslo. They’re a simmering pot of phuture soul, West African rhythms and cheerful Afrofuturism, the rapid offset breakbeat-splash and electrophonic edge of grime and broken-beat, and (in particular) spiritual jazz.

That said, they’re well aware that they should steer clear of romantic oversimplifications about roots. As Ahnanse remarked in an interview with ‘The Vinyl Factory’ last year, “the roots of what we are creating starts outside of that context, jazz is not the only source of improvised music in the world. It happens in many forms and many cultures, we all come from different spaces and cultures, and it isn’t black American culture, none of us were born there, so actually we are bringing all of those other experiences into this… In a society that is so hegemonic and monotonous it’s nice to surprise yourself and be surprised, by people that you know well.” More than anything else, Steam Down work is inspired by the interlocking of Afro-diasporan culture with week-by-week London life – the information-rich bustle and challenges of a world city made up of people from everywhere, many of them sometimes pushing (or knocking heads) against half-invisible restrictions and oppressions as well as providing broad-mindedness and opportunity. Occasionally the words “church” and “spiritual warfare” are used.

Steam Down’s shifting but family-loyal cloud of membership has included tuba boss Theon Cross, Maisha/Nérija saxophonist Nubya Garcia and keyboard player Dominic Canning (the latter also contributing at ‘Vocal Classics Of The Black Avant-Garde‘ on the 7th). In the rhythmatist corner are Sons Of Kemet/Nok Cultural Ensemble’s young drum-sage Edward Wakili “Nache” Hick and beatmaker Tilé “D’Vo” Gichigi-Lipere. There’s also a bevy of integral singer-poet-rappers in the shape of CarLi Adams, Norwegian-Philipino And Is Phi, Brother Portrait, sometime DJ/illustrator/maker Alex Rita, and the Afro-liminally-minded polymath Nadeem Din-Gabisi (DJ, artist, poet and broadcaster). Multiple talents are at play, with many members teaching and plenty of them producing. They’re a diverse, voluntary hive mind, their individualities fused and encouraged by common purpose, and there are sub-groups, independent familial endeavours and more (for instance, And Is Phi and D’vo work together as Sawa-Manga in a lineup including Saskia Horton from Nihilism).

This particular gig features a Steam Down line-up of Ahnanse, Alex, Dominic, Portrait, Theon, Nadeem, Nache and Sawa Manga plus Nihilism drummer Benjamin Appiah, singer Naima Adams and crunktronic Leeds beatmaker Wonky Logic. Also in the frame are a ton of integrated name guests from up and down the UK jazz scene – no details yet on who they’ll be, but rest assured they’ll be committed to their seat at the table..

https://youtu.be/5Rh29k7MYmc

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Dates:

Jazz re:freshed & Jazz Cafe present:
The Sounds of 2019 featuring Chelsea Carmichael + Nihilism + Vertaal
The Jazz Café, 5 Parkway, Camden Town, London, NW1 7PG, England
Wednesday 9th January 2019, 7.00pm – information here, here and here

Jazz Herstory presents:
Alexandra Ridout
Poplar Union, 2 Cotall Street, Poplar, London, E14 6TL, England
Thursday 17th January 2019, 7.30pm – information here and here

Steam Down: ‘The Live Album’
The Albany, Douglas Way, Deptford, London, SE8 4AG, England
Saturday 26th January 2019, 7.00pm – information here and here

Tags: Afro-futurism, Ahnanse, Ajit Gill, Alex Rita, Alexandra Ridout, And.Is.Phi, Benjamin Appiah, Brother Portrait, Cassie Kinoshi’s Seed, Chelsea Carmichael, Christopher Luu, D'Vo (Tilé Gichigi-Lipere), Dominic Canning, Freddie Jensen, Jazz Herstory (event/promoter), Jazz re:freshed (event/promoter), London (England), Loren Hignell, Lorenz Okello-Osengor, Luca Caruso, Miles Mindlin, Nache (Edward Wakili Hick), Nadeem Din Gabisi, Naima Adams, Nihilism (band), Noah Stoneman, Nubya Garcia, Saskia Horton, Shango Ijishakin, Simon Todd, Sons Of Kemet, Steam Down, Tastemakers Jazz (promoter), Theo Howarth, Theon Cross, Vertaal, Warren Woodcraft, Wonky Logic

January 2019 – upcoming London gigs – Monelise, Laura Victoria, Paul Reynolds and Paul Go free in Peckham; Amy Balog at the Poetry Café; The Osiris Club, Kavus Torabi and ANTA in Camden (all 9th January)

4 Jan

Three for next Wednesday…

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A free gig down in Peckham showcases four independent songwriters, with recent Goldsmiths graduate Monelise at the head of the bill. Positioning herself in the dreamy, arty end of pop, she tosses leading comparisons and tells around like chiffon scarves – David Lynch, Kate Bush, her own synaesthesia – and the talk-up seems to be working so far, with her videos being played in Topshop and a Pledgemusic campaign working hard at getting her debut EP completed (and her live shows up and running across a Mediterranean living-room tour and an Edinburgh Fringe fixture). She’s clearly as much a visual artist as a musical one, with her final degree show at the Deptford Albany last December already featuring screens, visuals and drifting snatches of 1920s opera shellac as well as a four-piece band.

I admire the ambition and industry, even if I’m not yet sold on the output. The influences Monelise is citing have the ability to reach down into your deep dreams and jar you. In comparison, she herself still seems content to drift along on the surface of a dusk dream, sounding pretty and basking in moonlight. I can only go by what I’m seeing. It’s possible that Monelise’s keeping her cards close to her chest as regards what she’s put out so far, and perhaps the live show’s the only current way of appreciating her in full. Available evidence shows two versions of her – the managed one (who releases slick spiritual-couture videos and tracks which blend contemporary pop and trip hop into seamless, depthless musings), and the far more interesting and unpolished live Monelise (who strives and juggles simultaneous singing, keyboards and theremin, and who might be shakier and more erratic at the moment but who also offers possibilities of growing, learning and interacting which her hermetically-sealed recorded persona currently doesn’t).

There are no such abstractions or evasions in the music of Laura Victoria. A onetime scion of Tyneside youth folk ensemble FolkESTRA North, she belts out punchy songs of life and love drawing from English folk, acoustic pop and Americana, accompanying herself on cello and leading a three-piece band featuring drummer Josh Wolfsohn and fiddler/banjoist Jo Cooper. Now up to her third album, and having been a regular presence on folk scene gigs up and down the country for twelve years, she’s confident and fully formed: what you see is what you get. I see sunniness, vigour and empathy in equal measure. In addition, she runs folk singing classes at Morley College and IKLECTIK, and has done at least one sprightly, ramshackle Joan Jett cover, if anyone’s interested…

Paul Go is another transplanted Northumbrian folkie, although of a very different order and style to Laura. His only available song so far is soft, shy and sweet – a gentle, momentary folk-pop sketch with brush drums, donkey-ride fingerpicking and fiddle contrasting awkward human reclusiveness with the unconscious confident grace of animals. Of the other two tracks he’s released, one’s a skittish, part-broken guitar improvisation designed to make use of the acoustic space of Ealing’s Vestry Hall. The other shows an unexpected interest in Chinese music, featuring the slithering sigh of an erhu fiddle, chimes and a guest narrative in Mandarin. Hopefully some of these other sides of Paul will bleed through in the concert: soft suburban musing and amiability are fine, but extra dimensions are better.

That’s something which already holds true for Paul Reynolds. Sometimes part of triple-threat modern folk trio Vespers, he plays bass for his own projects and for various other people, but graduates to piano for his own solo songs and for spacious, introverted instrumental improvisations (sometimes artfully jarred by odd tunings and by interspersed sound effects and electronics). I’m guessing that the songs will take preeminence this time around. Evidence so far suggests that they’re in the classic vein of chamber-folk touched with elements of classical and chanson, and thrumming behind a patina of English reserve: a mixture of craft and of carefully harboured emotion. Paul’s also got a sideline in little sonic experimental dramas such as The Brading Experience, suggesting a quietly uncontainable musician and aural imagination behind the meticulous skill.

https://soundcloud.com/paulreynoldsbass/feel-the-cold
https://soundcloud.com/paulreynoldsbass/there-are-flowers-full
https://soundcloud.com/paulreynoldsbass/new-appetite

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All right – in advance of her spoken word/musical set at the Poetry Cafe, here’s Amy Balog‘s opening statement:

“The hungry vulture of feminism is circling in the grey sky above the dying Femme Fatale. She’s being tortured to death by girls who don’t understand her power, thinking it somehow makes them weaker. Her admirers are collecting her sweet, priceless blood in vintage crystal flasks, trying to preserve at least this one colour still left in a humourless and passionless world. But she’s still breathing, and it’s not too late to save her from a cruel demise…”

I’m not sure quite what to make of Amy yet. She’s a Hungarian Londoner infused with Gothic prose and horror erotica; a refugee from science journalism who carried out a moonlight flit into the world of speculative fiction and dream psychology. Having reinvented herself as a novelist and poet, she’s now (at the age of twenty-seven) standing up in front of audiences to deliver a performance-poetry manifesto exploring “the nature of femininity and feminine power from a perspective critical of contemporary feminism… other themes include political correctness, identity politics, religion and mental illness.” As part of the process, she’s struck up an alliance with jazz-psych guitarist Carlos Ferrao, who brings a splintery musical soundscape to her recitations – hollowbody chugs, echoes and grumbles, deliquescing now-you-see-them-now-you-don’t riffs.

https://youtu.be/Nhw1Ty_H6Js

Heh. I’ve never much trusted anyone who scorns and decries “political correctness” and uses that ire as a rallying call. Having watched or suffered losses and setbacks related to mental illness, I’m suspicious of anything which politicises or potentially celebrates madness; and the fact remains that if you’re a woman arguing against feminism, you’re basically aiming an axe at your own ankles. That said, there’s more to Amy than flashy reactionary advertising or self-indulgent apologism. By her own admission, there’s plenty of Camille Paglia in her work, plenty of Jung, Nietzsche, Poe and the Comte du Lautréamont – the bloodwork of surrealism, expressionism, contrarian thought, like a kind of Goth take on Lydia Lunch.

Don’t expect measured, objective consideration here. Amy’s interested in transformative apocalypses, irrational dream quests and night journeys, the truth implicit in the fluid and contradictory power balance between artist and muse, or about the flip side of objectification. Her female narrators may be thwarted or humiliated or imperilled, but they’re also resistant and strangely bulletproof, with a core of self-will: heroic archetypes determined to establish their own concept of femaleness. Core to this is Amy’s own perception of beauty as a force in its own right – it threads through her words, and her Gothic redhead looks and sensual witchy Tori Amos presence are an integral part of her work; the vessel for the wine.

Perhaps it’s best to allow for the fact that feminism, by its very nature, is a broad church with room for multiple perspectives and considerations; that there are many pathways to female assertion and that none of them should be readily shouted down; and that Amy’s still in the early stages of her night journey. Despite her determined stance, at the moment there are more questions and challenges in place than answers. It may be interesting to see where she goes.

https://youtu.be/npQJh9R2wXY
https://youtu.be/PxMSNxbGFEc

* * * * * * * *

A heavier, more masculine psychedelia gets an airing up at the Black Heart, where record label Old Empire are putting on a night of darker and/or harder sounds, headed up by occult post-punk/progressive metal metallers The Osiris Club.

Originally formed with the intent of fusing horror film soundtracks with instrumental avant-metal, the OC has now swollen to a full-on song septet. The changes seem to be resulting in accessible, gloomily elegant tritone epics of tingling guitar and droning indie vocal; as if The House of Love had thrown their hands up in the air and confessed to having been fantasy comics fans all along (while various members of Fantômas grinned and egg them on in the background). That said, for epics such as A Winter’s Night On Sentinel Hill the Club pull out all of the Hawkwind oscillators and Van Der Graaf/Iron Maiden declamations, unveiling a Lovecraft-prog grandeur in full glorious/ghastly melodrama.

No such code-switching games for ANTA – described by Chaos Theory as the purveyors of “velvetine cosmic textures delivered as a hammer blow to the soul”, they open the show with their own enthusiastically convoluted, heavy-prog brain-tangling rock swing. Sandwiched in the middle is Kavus Torabi. Having recently exploded the Garage at the helm of his psychedelic prog octet Knifeworld, he returns to the sullen, trepidatious, post-nova ember-glow of his solo work; trawling through shimmering webs of harmonium, effected drones and knell-clangs of acoustic guitar, exploring a forbidding hinterland of vulnerability and permeable spirit-space.

* * * * * * * *

Dates:

Monelise + Laura Victoria + Paul Reynolds + Paul Go
Rye Wax, 133 Rye Lane, Peckham, London, SE15 4ST, England
Wednesday, 9 January 2019, 7.30pm – information here

The Poetry Society presents:
Amy Balog: ‘The Dying Femme Fatale – An Evening of Poetry and Music’
The Poetry Cafe, 22 Betterton Street, Covent Garden, London, WC2H 9BX, England
Wednesday 9th January 2019, 7.00pm – information here and here

Old Empire presents:
The Osiris Club + Kavus Torabi + Anta
The Black Heart, 2-3 Greenland Place, Camden Town, London, NW1 0AP, England
Wednesday 9th January 2019, 7.00pm – information here, here and here

Tags: Amy Balog, ANTA, Carlos Ferrao, Jo Cooper, Josh Wolfsohn, Kavus Torabi, Laura Victoria, listening to women, London (England), Monelise, Paul Go, Paul Reynolds, The Osiris Club, theremin music, Vespers, women of heart and mind

January 2019 – upcoming London jazz gigs – memories of black resistance and striving in Elaine Mitchener’s ‘Vocal Classics Of The Black Avant Garde’ (7th January) and Rufus Reid’s ‘Quiet Pride’ (29th January)

3 Jan

This month, there are two very different opportunities to immerse yourself in historical music stemming from black resistance and the American civil rights struggle; the conflation of brutual oppression, storms, suffering and self-assertion which inform today’s #BlackLivesMatter movement.

One of these events is an edgy art-scream of vintage fighting classics, happening inside a rough-walled underground music stronghold. The other features music that’s barely seven years old, takes place in a lofty varnished orchestral concert hall at the heart of the British classical music world, comes varnished by a couple of Grammy nominations and represents the other end of the struggle: more well-spoken, staunchly dignified, talking back at the oppressor in something closer to his own language on his own terrain.

Would each of these efforts give the other house room? I’d like to think that they would.

* * * * * * * *

Tireless vocal/physical-movement improviser and conceptual explorer Elaine Mitchener returns to Café Oto with a revival of her ‘Vocal Classics of the Black Avant Garde’ project (originally compiled and performed for the London Festival of Contemporary Music at the end of 2017). Re-examining 1960s and 1970s works composed by Eric Dolphy, Archie Shepp, Joseph Jarman and Jeanne Lee, it studies and recreates “the overflow of experiment that occurred within improvised music, often springing directly from lived experiences of racial injustice… combin(ing) vocals and text with experimental jazz forms.”

Musical direction for the evening will come from reknowned saxophonist Jason Yarde – an improviser-composer who steps confidently between jazz and conservatoire culture. He’ll be at the head of a band consisting of pianist Dominic Canning, Elaine’s regular bassist Neil Charles, trumpeter and flautist Byron Wallen and the consistently staggering drummer/percussionist Mark Sanders. It’s a little unclear as to whether Elaine’s regular sparring partner Alexander Hawkins will be joining in on keyboards this time, but expat American poet Dante Micheaux is down to join Elaine on spoken/sung word.

Joseph Jarman

It’s safe to say that while this music’s around fifty years old now, the content’s not going to be cosy. Expect some old wounds, some revolutionaries’ pride and some old fire to be raked over and rekindled. As Elaine writes, “these works illuminate an occluded moment in American cultural history, when the avant-garde aesthetics of new jazz doubled as a metaphor for the imminent politics of civil rights.

“Composed in very specific response to the perilous condition of black people in America, the works’ synthesis of experimental sensibilities, radical political sentiment, and gutbucket expression cuts across boundaries of time and space to resonate universally in the here and now. In the era of #BlackLivesMatter, these works speak powerfully of the need for resistance and resilience, sound stark and original, their hypermodernism firmly rooted in vernacular tradition.”

It doesn’t seem that anything of the previous show’s been recorded (or if it has been, it’s not been released), so here’s a little from one of Elaine’s previous projects as an indicator; plus a little Shepp, Lee and Jarman.

* * * * * * * *

Reminding us that the politics of dignity and survival (and the business of conveying an urgent message) comes in many different forms and tones, African-American double bassist Rufus Reid is reviving his 2012 jazz orchestra suite ‘Quiet Pride’ in London later in January. A limber, elegant musician and composer with profound roots in classical trumpet and bass, Rufus (like Jason Yarde) also straddles the worlds of jazz and music education with equal enthusiasm, grace and fervour. He has been playing in both small and sizeable jazz groups since the late ‘60s and composing for about the same length of time, moving into the world of large-scale compositions in 2011 with his symphonic orchestral work ‘Mass Transit’.

Rufus Reid (photo © Jimmy Katz)

‘Quiet Pride’ was written to honour and illustrate the work of late African–American sculptor and printmaker Elizabeth Catlett, and Rufus has taken it around the universities and culture halls of the USA whenever possible. This particular performance of the suite will be rendered by the Guildhall Jazz Orchestra under the direction of London jazz composer and educator Scott Stroman (with, I think, Rufus as conductor). While Rufus prefers to play alongside or surrounded by actual Catlett prints and sculptures for honour, reflection and continuity, there aren’t any to hand at the Guildhall and so the performance will be accompanied by projected Catlett images.

Set against the Oto show, it could be tempting to decry this as bourgeois slickness, a birch-and-beech art gallery indulgence co-opting jazz into the spaces of white power structures or celebrating some kind of house-Negro ethic. That would be unfair, shallow and revolting. To dispel that kind of wretched political preciousness, consider Elizabeth Catlett’s actual life; the source of her art and the ultimate inspiration for Rufus’ humming, quick-footed, assertive music in which (according to ‘All About Jazz’s Dan Bilawsky) “chamber-esque civility can give way to a feeling of uncertainty which, in turn, can morph into swing. Focus shifts from the textural to the rhythmic, the background to the foreground, and the subtle to the obvious. The music is mutable and multifaceted but that’s not really surprising; sculptures can take on different meaning when viewed from different angles so the music should certainly do the same.”

A pioneering presence as both a black and a female sculptor in America (at a time when few of either were to be found – or, more pertinently, allowed) Elizabeth perpetually fused art and activism, mostly through effort and moral choices. Flat-out rejected as a scholar by the Carnegie Institute of Technology due to her skin colour; struggling against direct, demoralising racist university policies while studying for a Masters in Iowa (and, later on, being stripped of her American citizenship as a result of her Communist associations and her gestures of solidarity with striking Mexican railway workers), hers is a story of personal industry, profound ethical responsibility, and effort against the odds.

Her time in Mexico (where she settled for much of her life, first learning and subsequently teaching) was also the catalyst for the crystallizing of her artistic vision, uniting her early influences of Henry Moore, Diego Rivera and pre-Columbian American sculpture with a commitment to combining aspirational concepts of strength and fierce dignity with representative figure forms. “I learned how you use your art for the service of people, struggling people, to whom only realism is meaningful” she’d assert, later. “I have always wanted my art to service my people — to reflect us, to relate to us, to stimulate us, to make us aware of our potential.”

Elizabeth’s figures and prints survive her and bear witness to her particular vision. Emblematic of black dignity, of powerful maternal femininity, of a refusal to be chained down by prejudices and programmes, they cradle their children; staunchly assert their curves; stand straight-backed, defiant and admirable; reveal the hidden or overlooked complexities of the black mind and sense of self; or punch the air as a simple, stark and meaningful mark of resistance. They’re already, in their way, as direct and as intricate as jazz: something which Rufus clearly understood from the start and has strived himself to bring across in music.

Dates:

Elaine Mitchener Projects presents:
Vocal Classics of the Black Avant Garde: Jason Yarde + Elaine Mitchener + Mark Sanders + Neil Charles + Dante Micheaux + Byron Wallen + Alexander Hawkins
Café Oto, 18-22 Ashwin Street, Dalston, London, E8 3DL, England
Monday 7th January 2019, 7.30pm – information here and here

Guildhall Jazz Orchestra/Rufus Reid/Scott Stroman: ‘Quiet Pride – The Elizabeth Catlett Project’
Milton Court Concert Hall @ Guildhall School of Music & Drama, Silk Street, Barbican, London, EC2Y 8DT, England
Tuesday 29th January 2019, 7.30pm – information here, here and here

Tags: #BlackLivesMatter, Alexander Hawkins, Archie Shepp, Art Ensemble Of Chicago, Byron Wallen, Dante Micheaux, Elaine Mitchener, Elizabeth Catlett, Eric Dolphy, Guildhall Jazz Orchestra, Jason Yarde, Jeanne Lee, Joseph Jarman, London (England), London Contemporary Music Festival (event), Mark Sanders, Neil Charles, Rufus Reid, Scott Stroman

January 2019 – upcoming London classical gigs – baroque, folk and present-day music intertwine at the second Baroque At The Edge festival (4th to 6th January)

2 Jan

As regards classical music, this month appears to be opening with London’s second annual Baroque At The Edge festival across the 4th, 5th and 6th January. Dividing its time between the Clerkenwell classical-church venues of LSO St Lukes and St James Clerkenwell, it starts from a baroque basis but roughly postulates (as it did last year) along the genre-blurring lines of “imagine if Bach was a jazzman, Purcell a folk-fiddler, and Monteverdi a minimalist…”

Following on from 2018’s debut festival, there’ll be a return engagement with concert dramatist Clare Norburn. Having tackled the murderous guilt and glory of Carlo Gesualdo last time around, Clare’s new work ‘Burying The Dead’ (premiered in the West Country last May) is another deathbed dream drama: this time set in 1695 and focusing on the final protracted thoughts and hallucinations of Henry Purcell as “dream-like memories of the Plague, the Fire of London, family life and the vibrant Restoration stage merge seamlessly with his exquisite vocal and instrumental music.” Said music will be provided by London-based baroque ensemble Ceruleo, who commissioned the play, while actor Niall Ashdown features as Purcell.

There’s more Purcell-related goings-on via Cecil Sharp House choir director and Wing-It Singer leader Sally Davies, who with her chorally-minded pianist daughter Holly Cullen Davies is running an open-to-all English folksong workshop, focussing on the songs Purcell would have known and referred to. In a similar spirit, the festival’s closing concert features a team-up of Dipper Malkin (John Dipper on fourteen-string viola d’amore, Dave Malkin on guitar and vocals) and singing storyteller Nick Hennessy – all three keen folk-steeped reinventors, on this occasion exploring how “the sophistication of Purcell meets the soul of English folk.”

Several more cross-disciplinary players are taking part. Violist Liam Byrne promises a concert in which you can “expect anything, anyhow, from (Marin) Marais to (Nico) Muhly”, although he’s keeping schtum on whether he’s playing pure and acoustic or with the electronics or conceptual tricks which make up the other side of his playing. Path-forging post-classical singer Nora Fischer, accompanied by theorbo lutenist Mike Fentross, will delve into the world of seventeenth century song with “intimate and exquisite re-imaginings of works by Purcell, Peri, Monteverdi and others.”

Elsewhere in the festival, vigorous violinist Elicia Silverstein will join the dots between Bach and Biber (representing the baroque) and Luciano Berio and Salvatore Sciarrino (representing the contemporary), as demonstrated on her 2018 debut recording ‘The Dreams And Fables I Fashion’. Replacing a planned baroque piano concert from Gabriela Montero (after she had to drop out following surgery), her fellow pianist David Greilsammer provides his ‘Scarlatti:Cage:Sonatas’ dual keyboard programme which constantly interlaces the music of Domenico Scarlatti with the twentieth-century prepared piano compositions of John Cage (hardware, wood and rubber resonating and burring between the strings).

Less compressed information, plus full dates and ticket info, can be found at the festival’s homepage and Facebook page.

‘Baroque At The Edge’
LSO St Luke’s, 161 Old Street, St Lukes, London, EC1V 9NG, England
St James Clerkenwell, Clerkenwell Close, Clerkenwell, London, EC1R 0EA, England
Friday 4th January to Saturday 6th January 2019 (various times) – information here and here

Tags: Baroque At The Edge (event/festival), Biber, Carlo Gesualdo, Ceruleo, Clare Norburn, Claudio Monteverdi, Dave Malkin, David Greilsammer, Dipper Malkin, Domenico Scarlatti, Gabriela Montero, Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber, Henry Purcell, Holly Cullen Davies, Jacopo Peri, Johann Sebastian Bach, John Cage, John Dipper, Liam Byrne, London (England), Luciano Berio, lute music, Marin Marais, men and women singing together, Mike Fentross, Niall Ashdown, Nick Hennessy, Nico Muhly, Nora Fischer, piano music, prepared piano music, Sally Davies, Salvatore Sciarrino, viol music, viola d’amore music

January 2019 – upcoming London folk gigs – Laboratorium Pieśni (5th January); Sincere Deceivers + Amy May Ellis (18th January); Shirley Collins in the round (31st January)

1 Jan

Premiering last month’s new album ‘Rasti’, heady world-folkers Laboratorium Pieśni make one of their regular returns to London at the start of the month, playing the grand octagonal space of the Union Chapel. Entering their sixth acclaimed year as a band, they’re an all-female seven-piece of polyphonic harmony singers and multi-instrumentalists from the Tri-City district of northern Poland, cooking up a stew of song with traditional material (initially from the Ukraine, but with a songbook now swollen to incorporate music from Poland, Belarus, Bulgaria and Turkey among others).

In keeping with the group’s identity as a “song laboratory” – as well as with their connection to instinctive responses and to healing processes – the songs which Laboratorium Pieśni play are festooned with flutes, violins, rebabs, shruti box drones and a web of tuned and untuned percussion (from chimes, gongs and rattles to shamanic drums), adding a mystical cosmic-feminine shimmer to the music’s existing roots. You can listen to an interview with the Laboratorium women (conducted by Canadian television station TVNR) here.

* * * * * * * *

Closer to home and further forward in time, propulsive electro-acoustic folk-pop trio Sincere Deceivers (with roots in Yorkshire but now resident in London) return to action via a new semi-live EP of original songs – their first in half a decade. ‘Hot Handed’ is the lead-off track – a yearning, Martin Furey-esque song of romantic obsession, full of chiming guitar and swirling cello.

For their Sebright Arms gig, Sincere Deceivers will be joined by another Yorkshire friend: emergent singer-songwriter Amy May Ellis. She’s touting last autumn’s debut EP ‘Weathered By Waves’: five dreamy ukelele-driven, water-fixated, altered-state song musings on youthful restlessness and the dislocation of emotion (orchestrated with shruti drones, harps and the soft echoing ghosts of guitar strings).

* * * * * * * *

A cornerstone figure of living English folk music is appearing at the Roundhouse at the end of the month, as part of the venue’s extensive In The Round concert season. Back in the mid-’60s Shirley Collins was one of the main exponents of the English folk revival: in her case, a revival drawing on a childhood fascination with the old folk songs which emerged from underneath the blanket of popular culture at times of stress or memory, as well as spells learning and researching alongside voracious American folk curator Alan Lomax and reconstructive British rule-setter Ewan MacColl (both of whom, to put it mildly, didn’t always credit or respect her for her own work, intelligence or contributions).

Beginning her career at the cusp of the ’50s and ’60s by taking Pete Seeger’s vocal-and-banjo American revival model of old and new work (and transmuting it into a more transatlantic mode), Shirley gradually worked her way deeper back into English forms. Along the way, she recorded the benchmark guitar-and-vocal album ‘Folk Routes, New Routes’ (with folk baroque guitarist Davy Graham) and a number of albums featuring the startling arrangements of her own keyboard-playing sister Dolly, plus foundational ’70s folk rock and Morris revival records with the Albion Country Band, the Morris On project and others.

Over the years she has inspired plenty of other musicians, be they the crop of folk-rockers who sprang up in her wake at the time, or more latterday disciples including alt.folk and alt.country explorers (such as Angel Olson and Josephine Foster), square-peg rock musicians with broad listening habits (such as Blur’s Graham Coxon and Radiohead’s Jonny Greenwood), off-beat songwriters who delightedly snag themselves onto folk ideas (such as Richard Larcombe of Lost Crowns and Stars In Battledress) or folk-tinged textural experimentalists like Current 93’s David Tibet and eclecti-ambient duo Cyclobe (the former of whom coaxed her back into musical work in 2006, and the latter of whom produced her 2016 comeback album ‘Lodestar’). Most recently, she’s been embraced by various exponents of the New Weird Britain musical movement, drawn to her songs by their archaeological texture and their frequent accounts of dark psychological swells, stark menace and human injustice.

https://youtu.be/aavD4Hjyfww

Yet Shirley’s spiritual legacy resides most purely in anyone (particularly, any woman) who picks up the thread of folk archetypes, winnows out any temptations towards twee fluffery and glib romantic posturing, and returns to the unadorned human grain of the music. Her own personal commitment and connection to the work, and to living the work honestly, is absolute (for good or ill – assailed by a traumatic late ’70s divorce from the Albion Band’s Ashley Hutchings, the impact of which slipped in under her staunch guard, she was physically unable to sing for the best part of thirty years). Shorn of the halo of veneration, her recordings are sparse and matter-of-fact, her voice that of a neighbourhood teller of tales (many of them harsh) rather than some fluting bel canto feelgood exercise. The natural habitat and venue for her work would seem to be some stone-flagged kitchen or ancient pub space rather than a concert hall: perhaps the focussing-lens effect of the Roundhouse’s setting and seating will meet that need halfway.

* * * * * * * *

Dates as follows:

Laboratorium Pieśni
Union Chapel, 19b Compton Terrace, Islington, London, N1 2UN, England
Saturday 5th January 2019, 8.00pm – information here and here

The Folkroom presents:
Sincere Deceivers + Amy May Ellis
The Sebright Arms, 33-35 Coate Street, Bethnal Green, London, E2 9AG, England
Friday, 18 January 2019, 7.00pm – information here and here

Shirley Collins
The Roundhouse, Chalk Farm Road, Camden Town, London, NW1 8EH, England
Thursday 31st January 2019, 7.00pm – information here and here

Tags: Amy May Ellis, Davy Graham, Dolly Collins, Laboratorium Pieśni, London (England), New Weird Britain, Shirley Collins, Sincere Deceivers, Sussex (England), The Albion Country Band, The Folkroom (promoters), Yorkshire (England)

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Categories 2019, a capella, acoustic music, acoustic pop, cross-cultural music, folk music, folk rock, folk-pop, previews, singer-songwriter, world & indigenous music

October 2018 – singer-songwriter album launches in London and Wales – Hazel Iris (25th October), Emma Lohan (25th, 26th October)

21 Oct

Looking for events with singer-songwriting women in London? This coming Thursday, you can go big or go small.

* * * * * * * *

If you’re going for the bigger option, there’s Hazel Iris’ album launch in Smithfield, at St. Bartholomew-the-Great, no less. It’s an event that sprawls across the entire church: its varied acts located in different places within the building, like a cross between a miniature festival and a stations-of-the-cross procession. In one corner, two classical musicians – Katrina Sheppeard and Jayson Gillham (who between them have racked up appearances with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, ENO, Melbourne Symphony and the Sydney Opera House) will provide a piano-and-soprano duet performance of Richard Strauss’s ‘Vier letzte Lieder’ – the composer’s last work, a four-song death-and-transfiguration sealing of his legacy, composed during the dusk of the Romantic era. Next, in another corner, Kate Arnold – usually to be found as frontwoman for dark classical-folk fusioneers Fear Of The Forest – will be playing solo and acoustic with hammer dulcimer, violin and voice, providing a set of songs reflecting her folk, medieval and Middle Eastern influences.

And so to the headliner, who’s recently been making a name for herself as a standout performer at the Blind Dog Studio evenings. Hazel Iris is a storyteller with an overwhelming musical streak; her tales drawn from her travels, her own musings and her borrowings from the great stewpot of mythology and folklore. California-born and London-based but world-honed, her songs blend indie-folk habits, vaudeville brassiness, operatic training, lieder romance and a dash of country.

Bringing her brand-new ‘Nine Sisters’ album to life at St Barts is a similarly broad-based nine-piece band. The rhythm section – drummer Fred Harper and double-bassist Twm Dylan – come from the London and Leeds jazz scenes, while Winter Quartet violinist Aurora Del Río Pérez and French horn player Jessica Cottis are both established in the classical world (the latter, notably, as a conductor – she’s returning to a childhood instrument for this performance). Harpist Tara Minton straddles both jazz and classical worlds. Rounding out the ensemble is cellist and screen music composer Matt Constantine, classical accordionist Aine McLoughlin (Hazel’s regular collaborator at previous Blind Dog gigs), and up-and-coming guitarist Myles Peters (who plays anything and anywhere he can).

Also integral to the show will be the puppets of Alicia Britt, artistic director for Wondering Hands Puppet Theatre. Her usual gig involves using puppetry of all kinds for the entertainment and nourishment of all ages, with an undercurrent of healing, conversation and a restoration of our human nature: work that ranges from carefully-thought-out fairy tales of bereavement and development for children to bawdily sexual puppet-cabaret for adults. Quite possibly all aspects will be making a showing in her support work for Hazel. I’ve no idea whether huge rod-guided creatures will be leaping through the church or whether the puppetry will be on a smaller, more human scale with creatures the size of lutes or horns, but it should add an extra level of story texture.

* * * * * * * *

Speaking of smaller, more human scales – if all of the above sounds too grand, then on the same London night another songwriter – Emma Lohan – is launching her own debut album up in the south end of Hackney. ‘Black Atlantic’ pulls together Emma’s own particular blend of Irish hometown influences (she’s a Galway woman), pop leanings and traveller’s scraps, drawn from her footloose global roamings. Impressions and stories, a kind of global coast-combing or, as I put it last time, “beautifully-constructed cloud-tossed songs imbued with the flicker of constant motion.” The album itself is a small, quiet-reveal treasure imbued with a bouncing, soft-chatting liveliness. There’s jigs and kalimba, there’s age and youth, there’s plenty of story to unspool.

She’s doing it all again the following night in Wales – in an unusual display of synchronicity, at a puppet theatre in Cardigan – in a puppet theatre. Elusive ska band Julian’s Reluctant SKAfterparty are in support: no more info on them, I’m afraid. (Update, 24th October – sadly the Cardigan show has had to be cancelled, but they’re promising to reschedule it soon…)

All dates:

Hazel Iris + Kate Arnold + Jayson Gilham & Katrina Sheppeard – St Bartholomew the Great, Cloth Fair, West Smithfield, Clerkenwell, London, EC1A 7JQ, England, Thursday 25th October 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here
Emma Lohan – NT’s Bar, 1 Westgate Street #207, London Fields, London, E8 3RL, England, Thursday 25th October 2018, 7.00pm – information here
Emma Lohan – Small World Theatre, Bath House Road, Cardigan, Ceredigion, SA43 1JY, Wales, Friday 26th October 2018, 8.00pm (with Julian’s Reluctant SKAfterparty) – information here and here

Tags: Aine Mcloughlin, Alicia Britt, Aurora Del Río Pérez, Cardigan (Wales), Emma Lohan, Fear Of The Forest, Fred Harper, Hazel Iris, Jayson Gilham, Jessica Cottis, Julian’s Reluctant SKAfterparty, Kate Arnold, Katrina Sheppeard, London (England), Matt Constantine, Myles Peters, Richard Strauss, Tara Minton, Twm Dylan, Wondering Hands Puppet Theatre

October 2018 – more Daylight Music sessions in London – Caoilfhionn Rose, Tomorrow’s Warriors StringTing and Abimaro (6th October); Terry Edwards, Seamus Beaghen, Douglas Dare and Deerful for ‘Organ Reframed’ (13th October)

1 Oct

Daylight Music‘s autumn season of free family-friendly Saturday lunchtime gigs continues with organ music, singer-songwriters, brass, jazz strings and synthpop…

* * * * * * * *

The 6th October show features Caoilfhionn Rose, Tomorrow’s Warriors StringTing and Abimaro.

“Caoilfhionn Rose has an eclectic range of influences, including the Mummers, Polly Paulusma, Broadcast, Rachel Sermanni and Peter Broderick. She featured on The Durutti Column’s 2014 album ‘Chronicle LX:XL.’ She is currently recording her debut album with Matthew Halsall of Gondwana Records.

“Tomorrow’s Warriors StringTing is a flagship ensemble from Tomorrow’s Warriors, the celebrated hothouse for young jazz talent in the UK, led by violinist Rhiannon Dimond. Blazing a wide trail for women and strings in jazz, their musicians are core players in Tomorrow’s Warriors’ acclaimed Nu Civilisation Orchestra and are ones to watch as they begin to make an indelible mark on the London jazz scene.

“Abimaro is a singer and songwriter from London who is inspired by life, faith and stories. Having previously lent her vocals to bands such as Zero 7, Cinematic Orchestra and The Free, Abimaro released her debut solo EP in July 2017. Abimaro is also a Music Facilitator, regularly leading projects for organisations including The Roundhouse, Spitalfields Music and the Southbank Centre.”

* * * * * * * *

The 13th October show is another in the Union Chapel’s ‘Organ Reframed‘ series, in which a variety of musicians play, interact with or are accompanied by the Chapel’s resident Willis pipe organ. In Daylight Music’s case, a variety of singer-songwriters from different disciplines are involved. On this occasion, the performers are Terry Edwards (with Seamus Beaghen), Douglas Dare and Deerful.

“Jazz and rock multi-instrumentalist Terry Edwards has performed and released records both as a solo artist and in collaboration with artists such as Madness, PJ Harvey, Spiritualised, Nick Cave and Tindersticks. For this special performance, he will be joined by composer Seamus Beaghen on Union Chapel’s Henry Willis organ. Seamus has played with Iggy Pop, Death in Vegas, Madness and Morrissey, to name but a few. The performance is going to be semi-improvised in four interlocking sections. A multi-genre musical offering, wind-based without electronics – the improvised giddy sound of pipes, trumpet and saxes (occasionally two at once!).

“Douglas Dare is a London-based singer-songwriter, originally from the coastal town of Bridport, South West England. His live sound combines acoustic instrumentation including piano and percussion with glitchy electronic elements. Inspired by the likes of Portishead, Elliott Smith and James Blake, Douglas combines a rich and haunting vocal with lyrics crafted from his own poems and short prose. For this performance he aims to play the organ as sensitively as he can, reworking some of his older material and introducing some new as he explores the organ’s sonorities in the chapel, singing tenderly with this powerful machine for the first time.

“Deerful is Emma Winston, a keyboard player, singer and producer based in London. She writes lush, sad, romantic electropop about feelings on synthesisers small enough to use on the bus. For this performance, Emma will combine the chapel’s Henry Willis organ with electronics.”

Daylight add “to get you in the mood for this show, we did an organ playlist from previous years and other related shows. It took a lot of organ-ising so we hope you’ll pull out the stops to make time to listen…ahem…”

* * * * * * * *

All gigs are at the usual place – Union Chapel, 19b Compton Terrace, Islington, London, N1 2UN, England – with a suggested donation of five pounds (go on, it’s worth it…) Dates below:

Daylight Music 290: Caoilfhionn Rose + Tomorrow’s Warriors StringTing + Abimaro – Saturday 6th October 2018, 12:00pm – information
Daylight Music 291: ‘Organ Reframed’ – Terry Edwards (with Seamus Beaghen) + Douglas Dare + Deerful – Saturday 13th October 2018, 12:00pm – information

Details on November Daylight concerts to follow in due course…

Tags: Abimaro, Arctic Circle (promoter), Caoilfhionn Rose, Daylight Music (event), Deerful, Douglas Dare, London (England), Organ Reframed (event), pipe organ music, Seamus Beaghen, Terry Edwards, Tomorrow's Warriors, Tomorrow's Warriors StringTing

October 2018 – upcoming London pop gigs – Bellatrix and Amy León; Clémentine March, Garden Party and Svetlana Smith (both 2nd October)

29 Sep

Polydisciplinary pop-charmer Belle Ehresman – better known as Bellatrix – pops up at Elektrowerx at the start of October. She’s been on the up for a couple of years now: the former leader of The Boxettes and a onetime UK beatboxing champion (as well as someone who’s chalked up a parallel musical life as a jazz double bassist), she’s recently subsumed all of these skills into a freeform pop approach.

I caught her a couple of years ago at Rich Mix, just her on her own. Citing influences from Bjork, Ravel, Nina Simone and Sun Ra, to Mingus, Fleetwood Mac and The Pharcyde, she was nothing if not eclectic. For half an hour the venue was her sketchpad as she flung out work-in-progress – a set of unclenched, openhanded musicality in which she finger-painted in assured fashion on mini-synth, loop station and double bass; unfurling songs, meditations and mouth-driven beatscapes in jazz, experimental pop and the loosest of hip hop tones; floating dreamily a little way above the earth.

Since then, Belle’s put together a band, spat out a couple of quirky EPs and stormed the big streaming services, bypassing Bandcamp and Soundcloud to go straight with the Tidals, the Deezers and the Spotifys. For all the boho trappings and the whimsicality (her first EP was called ‘Real Stuffed Owls’), there’s clearly quite a bit of faith and funding behind her. While her former freeformery has settled into more accessible attention-gripping songcraft, I’m hoping that her wholesome world will mesh enough with the demands of that level of glaring attention sharky commercial demands: dropping into one of her sessions should feel like visiting an enchanted workshop, not like chasing a YouTuber.

In support is New York singer, songwriter and slam-poet Amy León. Once part of the Nuyorican Slam Team, she now rolls solo: a powerful, joyous, positive-political performer with her work rooted in specific experiences (blackness, womanhood, social inequality) and fusing them all into a compulsive stew of hip-hop spoken-word and sung R&B. Amy’s subject matter’s stirred by rage and outrage, the surviving of brutality and broad sweeps of oppression. Her ethic is to overcome it (in time-honoured civil-rights-movement manner), via a celebration of love, bursting through shame and tears with defiance.

She can sing like battered, determined grass, giving with the gale; she can speak soft; she can wail with rage. Her hard-hitting grit will anchor Belle’s dextrous free-floating thistledown. It would be fascinating to see what they came up with together.

https://soundcloud.com/amyleon3/on-the-run-1

Bellatrix + Amy Leon
Electrowerkz, 7 Torrens Street, Islington, London, EC1V 1NQ, England
Tuesday 2nd October 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here

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On the same night, Friends Serene are putting on a show of their own. Headlining is former Water Babies member and current Snapped Ankles-er Clémentine March – French-born, Brazil-schooled, London-cradled. Solo, she mixes the pressing, noisy dynamic of ‘90s indie rock with the airy, summery liberation of French and Latin pop melodies. Clanging, precisely-tooled guitar parts (like little iron chandeliers) mesh gently with her sleepy Gallic coo, which in turn rises to indie-siren clarions as she rambles across three languages at will. She’s a sleepy intermittent whirlwind, variously flicking up the debris and festival decorations in Mediterranean towns, and sometimes swirling them into intent little vortices as the mood takes her.

In support, Garden Party are the duo of singer Yujin Jo and instrumentalist George Edmondson. They bring along bedsit-glamour trip hop sounds in a Portishead/Moloko tradition, reaching towards a skinny R&B feel. It sounds thin as tissue paper or thrift-shop bedsheets at points, and Yujin’s voice is a tiny Eartha-kitten laze. Still, Garden Party revel in the worn, recovered texture of their soundworld and – on recent track Real Tapes – sometimes reach out for something a little more ambitious; rattling their collection of instruments, oddments and samples to reach out through the radio towards a bigger world.

Russian-inspired “neurotic synthpop duo” Svetlana Smith complete the bill: they’ve had a debut EP out since July, which you can find on Spotify if you like. As with Bellatrix, they seem to have vaulted a promotional stage: and since I object to streaming services which rip their clients off, I avoid Spotify like the plague and have stayed pretty ignorant as to what SS sound like. However, both ‘Bittersweet Symphonies‘ and ‘From the Streets‘ caught them just under a year ago: the latter highlighted “innocent but empowering love songs, preaching about love for yourself not another, all bought together in an elegant package taped together by sickly sweet and catchy melodies” while the former reported back on something “cynical and sexy, sweet but deadly… synth-pop with bitter lyrics of heartbreak and disdain.”

That’s the way of it, I suppose: a person can show completely different faces to different people on the same occasion, and one man’s light ear candy is another’s compelling poison. At least they agreed on the initial sweet taste; while I’m left wondering whether Svetlana Smith is deliberately Janus-faced, a kind of emotional double agent or just some kind of cannily blank song-canvas. You’ll have to find out for yourself.

This is a free event, but the usual “book-your-slot-first-and-turn-up-early” business applies.

Friends Serene presents:
Clémentine March + Garden Party + Svetlana Smith
The Shacklewell Arms, 71 Shacklewell Lane, Shacklewell, London, E8 2EB, England
Tuesday 2nd October 2018, 7.30pm – free event – information here, here and here

Tags: Amy León, Bellatrix (rapper), Clementine March, Friends Serene (promoters), Garden Party, London (England), Snapped Ankles, Svetlana Smith, Water Babies

October 2018 – upcoming classical/experimental gigs in London, Manchester and Birmingham – Jack Sheen’s an Assembly tour performances of Louis D’Heudieres, Rowland Hill and Charlie Usher (1st, 2nd, 4th October); Kammer Klang returns with performances of Matthew Shlomowitz, Phill Niblock and Ryoko Akama by Lucy Railton, Evie Hilyer-Ziegler, Jessica Aszodi, Antoine Françoise and Patrick Stadler (2nd October)

28 Sep

At the start of October, Jack Sheen’s experimental music ensemble An assembly embark on a brief three-date English tour including the world premieres of two brand-new, specially commissioned pieces and the London premiere of a third.

“An assembly are a group dedicated to contemporary and experimental music, installation and performance. Conceived as a large, open, and flexible group with no fixed line up, format or personnel, An assembly have appeared in many guises, tackling works from virtuosic ensemble scores to mass group readings, via text scores, graphic notation, long duration performances, one-on-one ASMR installations, physical performance, and wrestling. For this tour, An assembly presents an ambitious two-part programme of new works by emerging composers and artists.

“Field recordings and midi-instruments are internalised, vocalised and imitated by voices and instruments in Louis D’Heudieres‘ ‘Laughter Studies 6b’; four vocalists stand downstage from a small instrumental quintet, describing and imitating their own private soundtracks of synthesised tunes and field recordings, transmitted to them via earphones in a surreal and hysterical collision of subjectivities accompanied by angular melodies and midi-drum solos.

“Award-winning visual artist Rowland Hill continues this process of interpreting found material in a new film and performance commissioned by An assembly. Created as a response to Edwin Denby’s 1959 review of Stravinsky’s final ballet ‘Agon’, Hill uses Denby’s review and its relentless metaphors, references and precise visual shocks as a script for a new work, taking the linguistic articulation of a dance and returning it to a choreographed state through film, live performance and sound in a work which Jack Sheen irreverently describes as the “silliest piece I have ever commissioned.”

“The concert will culminate in the world premiere of ‘An assembly’ by Brussels-based composer Charlie Usher, a forty-five minute meditation on listening, hearing, and duration for large ensemble and audio. A constant wave of fourteen-second miniatures, ‘An assembly’ invites us to eavesdrop on real-time transcriptions of music Usher listened to while writing, and as the piece folds into itself, and unfolds away from us, we trace this vast new work into our evening.”

Dates below: note that the London concert is free, but you’ll need to book a space via a ticket system. Note also that there’s a more in-depth preview of this concert tour on Ben Harper’s ‘Boring Like A Drill‘ blog.

International Anthony Burgess Foundation, Chorlton Mill, 3 Cambridge Street, Manchester, M1 5BY, England, Monday 1st October 2018, 7.30pm – information here, here and here
Performance Space, City, University of London, College Building, St John Street, Finsbury, London, EC1V 4PB, England, Tuesday 2nd October 2018, 7.00pm – free event – information here, here and here
Centrala, Unit 4, Minerva Works, 158 Fazeley Street, Birmingham, B5 5RT, England, Thursday 4th October 2018, 7.30pm – information here, here and here

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In the same week, avant-classical/experimental chamber evening Kammer Klang returns to London to start its own autumn series.

The main draw for the October opener is the British premiere of Matthew Shlomowitz’s ‘Lecture About Listening to Music’, 2017 performed by two members of Ensemble Nikel (pianist Antoine Françoise – this time on synthesizer – and saxophonist Patrick Stadler) and by singer Jessica Aszodi. A well-known interdisciplinary singer, Jessica has mastered an unusually wide vocal range: on this occasion, however, she’ll just be talking, delivering the lecture component as Antoine and Patrick traverse a range of musical ideas including unsettling atmospherics and repetition, quotes from 1980s mainstream pop and cerebrally playful and jazzy concepts.

Post-modernism aside, this is an upfront and accessible piece. It’s literally, a talk on how we, with our information-age sweep of unconscious and studied influences, access and process music in the present day (but with Matthew providing lengthy, sympathetic musical illustrations as well as the lecture text). Here’s an earlier performance: also featuring Antoine and Patrick, and with Matthew himself in the role of lecturer.

Kammer Klang’s programmer Lucy Railton will be performing ‘Harm’ by New York minimalist/microtonalist drone composer Phill Niblock; a 2003 drone piece sourced from cello. Here’s an earlier version, with the source tones performed by cellist Arne Deforce, to give you an idea…

The October Fresh Klang piece (performed by violinist and recent Goldsmiths music graduate Evie Hilyer-Ziegler) is Ryoko Akama’s ‘Reaction, for a string instrument’, composed this year. Ryoko’s pieces, sometimes released via text scores and conceived as much as performances as they are compositions, are attempts to create “listening situations that magnify silence, time and space… offer(ing) quiet temporal/spatial experiences.” A performer herself, she works with “tiny aural and visual occurrences that embody “almost nothing” aesthetics“: small items from which miniscule sounds can be coaxed and made microscopically purposeful. A peek at Ryoko’s homepage reveals delicate assemblages (everyday lab equipment, ancient pedal sewing machines, tin cans, glass bottles, kitchenware, paper balloons, woolen gloves) waiting to be played. As regards Evie’s violin interpretation, I reckon it’s fair to expect some very small, quiet violin playing: perhaps a fitful breath on the strings…

Kammer Klang presents:
Jessica Aszodi/Antoine Françoise/Patrick Stadler perform Matthew Shlomowitz / Lucy Railton performs Phill Niblock / Evie Hilyer-Ziegler performs Ryoko Akama
Café Oto, 18-22 Ashwin Street, Dalston, London, E8 3DL, England
Tuesday 2nd October 2018, 7.30pm – information here, here and here

Tags: An assembly (chamber ensemble), Antoine Françoise, Arne Deforce, Birmingham (England), Charlie Usher, Cooky La Moo (Ben Harper), Evie Hilyer-Ziegler, Jack Sheen, Jessica Aszodi, Kammer Klang (event), listening to women, London (England), Louis D’Heudieres, Lucy Railton, Manchester (England), Matthew Shlomowitz, Patrick Stadler, Phill Niblock, Rowland Hill, Ryoko Akama

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Categories 2018, 21st century classical music, acoustic music, chamber music, classical (Western art music), drone music, electro-acoustic music, experimental music, films, instrumental music, interactive performances, minimalism, New Music, performance art, previews

September 2018 – upcoming London folk gigs – Nest Collective’s Campfire Club shows, part 2 – Jim Causley and Saskia Maxwell (15th September); The Hut People and Danny Peddler & Rosie Butler-Hall (21st September); Kit Hawes & Aaron Catlow and Jake Morley (28th September)

13 Sep

Here’s the second batch of September gigs in Nest Collective‘s Campfire Club shows in the open air in London parks, gardens, playgrounds…

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The 15th September gig features Jim Causley and Saskia Maxwell.

“Since the release of his debut album in 2005, Jim Causley’s unique voice and persona have helped him become one of the most well-loved and respected figures of today’s contemporary roots and folk scene. He’s won numerous accolades (including no less than six nominations for a BBC Radio 2 Folk Award and the title of “finest singer of his generation” from ‘Mojo’), presented his own folk music show on BBC Radio Devon. in 2015 he worked with BBC TV historian Dr Sam Willis to create the music for his show ‘Highwaymen, Outlaws and Villains’; In 2017 Jim composed the entire soundtrack for Cornish filmmaker Jane Darke’s BBC4 biographical film about his relative, the poet Charles Causley.

“A prolific collaborator, Jim is hugely admired for his work with iconic groups The Devil’s Interval and Mawkin:Causley as well as playing, touring and recording alongside Waterson:Carthy, John McCusker, Eddie Reader, Graham Coxson, Shirley Collins, Michael Morpurgo, Show of Hands, Kate Rusby, David Rotheray (of Beautiful South fame) and many more.

“Saskia Maxwell is a singer-songwriter, guitarist and flautist who hails from Cornwall. Born into a musical family (and inspired by bands like Pentangle, Fairport Convention, Dead Can Dance and Cocteau Twins), she has always been surrounded by music and was classically trained on guitar, flute and piano from an early age. She has gigged extensively, performing over six hundred shows and festivals in the UK alone and supporting the likes of Ralph McTell, Rae Morris, JP Cooper, Nick Harper and Rachel Sermanni.

“Whilst her first three EPs encompassed soulful jazz styles and exuberant folk songs, her more recent performances display a new-found purpose and grace and are suggestive of a move towards a more otherworldly and ethereal folk style. Her new songs are explorative of many moods and perspectives that share a common purpose of being spiritually provocative and invigorating/ A full debut album, ‘Entertaining Possibilities’ is coming soon.”

https://youtu.be/xmH2xEPIfK4

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The 21st September gig features The Hut People and Danny Peddler & Rosie Butler-Hall.

“This is a show like nothing you’ve ever seen before – expect feel-good dancing tunes, audience participation, step dancing, Quebecois foot-percussion (whilst playing the accordion!) and humour aplenty. Taking the audience on a musical journey around the world, English instrumental duo The Hut People (Sam Pirt and Gary Hammond) have firmly established themselves as one of the best loved, entertaining and best-loved acts on the UK folk scene today.

“Mixing global rhythms with folk tunes from Quebec to Spain, Scandinavia to Sussex and everywhere in between, this is a quirky celebration of our rich musical heritage – and it works so well!

“Danny Pedler & Rosie Butler-Hall are two young and dynamic musicians who formed as a duo in late 2011. Danny (from Essex) plays hurdy-gurdy and accordion, and Rosie (from Wiltshire) plays five-string fiddle and sings. They play mostly English and French songs and tunes and enjoy a close relationship with the audience at our live gigs. Their music is characterised by flowing melodies, intricate harmonies and strong rhythms while keeping the flavour of the traditional style.”

https://youtu.be/hVDDsuC5oWE

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The last September gig, on the 28th, features Kit Hawes & Aaron Catlow and Jake Morley.

“Kit Hawes & Aaron Catlow are a Bristol-based duo playing acoustic, folk and roots music. They’ve worked with many artists including Seth Lakeman, Afro Celt Sound system, Yola Carter, Mad Dog Mcrea, Sheelanagig and Roni Size (to name a few) but what unites them is a passion for folk music. They draw on their many influences to created unique arrangements of traditional song and tunes, as well as their own compositions.

“Kit and Aaron’s debut album ‘The Fox’ explores the relationship between fiddle, guitar and voice, using the fertile ground of the traditional music of the British Isles as its starting point. The product of decades of musical experience, it combines self penned tunes and folk tales, all intricately arranged and heartfelt. The live show is a musical journey through Europe and beyond; combining dazzling playing with a fine sense of musicality and showmanship.

“Having played over four hundred gigs in the past few years, it’s hardly surprising that Jake Morley has been invited to share the stage with many leading lights of modern English songwriting such as Ed Sheeran, Ben Howard and Lucy Rose. Seriously captivating live, his groundbreaking and unusual lap-tapping guitar techniques are just an accompaniment to his true passion for words and ideas and their power to connect.

“His most recent album, ‘The Manual’ – produced and mixed by Calum Malcolm (The Blue Nile, Prefab Sprout) – was released in summer 2016 to stunning reviews: his sound now developed and matured whilst maintaining its unique directness and his capacity for strong hooks and big tunes, with the addition of stunning string arrangements by Kate St John (Dream Academy, Van Morrison) bringing a deeper dimension to the sound.”

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Full dates:

Campfire Club: Jim Causley + Saskia Maxwell – Phytology, Bethnal Green Nature Reserve, Middleton Street, Bethnal Green, London, E2 9RR, England, Saturday 15th September 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here
Campfire Club: The Hut People + Danny Peddler & Rosie Butler-Hall – Lumpy Hill Adventure Playground, 15 Market Road, Lower Holloway, London, N7 9PL, England, Friday 21st September 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here
Campfire Club: Kit Hawes & Aaron Catlow + Jake Morley – Oasis Nature Garden, Larkhall Lane, Stockwell, London, SW4 6RJ, England, Friday 28th September 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here

Tags: Campfire Club (event), Danny Peddler & Rosie Butler-Hall, Gary Hammond, Jake Morley, Jim Causley, Kit Hawes & Aaron Catlow, London (England), Sam Pirt, Saskia Maxwell, The Hut People, The Nest Collective (event/promoter)

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Categories 2018, acoustic music, acoustic pop, alternative folk, folk music, improvisation, instrumental music, pop, previews, roots music, singer-songwriter

September 2018 – upcoming London acoustic gigs – One Voice, One Cello And A Mad Belgian (14th, 19th, 23rd, 28th September); Alice Zawadzki & Alice Purton (21st September)

10 Sep

Some sparky shows in little London locations…

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This month, Rupert Gillett and Jennifer El Gammal relaunch their new collaboration as One Voice, One Cello And A Mad Belgian onto the live stage with a brace of London gigs, following their debut gig in Stoke Newington back in August.

Rupert is the cellist: a sharp-dressed, cheerful and irreverent diversifier who uses the instrument to explore jazz, rock, folk, pop and various other genres… anything as long as it isn’t classical. Projects he’s involved with have included Dai & The Ramblers and the London Klezmer Quartet and his own Many Celli orchestra. As part of all this, he’s an established improviser and occasional radio/television performer: in addition, he’s an offbeat singer-songwriter whose subject matter spans “aliens, robots, space invaders, murderous bogeymen, mathematics, life after death, fairy godfathers, war, peace, love, death, taxation and other serious issues of the day”. Notably for a contemporary solo performer, Rupert eschews loops and effects. When you hear him live, it’s just him, the necessary techniques and a dose of imagination.

Jennifer (the titular Mad Belgian) is many things – her website lists “writer, comedian, sociologist, tour guide and magician”, and she’s a former theatre performer – but as a musician and master improviser she specialises in soprano saxophone and melodeon as well as singing, playing with modern jazz trio Uživati, folk band Virevoltes and solo under the Mad Belgian monicker. She defines the dreamier, more eccentric end of the Fripp-defined “small, mobile, intelligent unit”, travelling with her instruments on a fold-up bicycle to creates “strange and wonderful musical sculptures” and “jazzy and melodic excursions”.

This is what they get up to, separately and together.

Dates here, all of them free or pay-what-you-like:

Babel ART House, 86 Stoke Newington High Street, Stoke Newington, London, N16 7PA, England, Friday 14th September 2018, 8.00pm – free entry – information here
Spit and Sawdust, 21 Bartholomew Street, Newington, London, SE1 4AL England, Wednesday 19th September 2018, 8.00pm – pay-what-you-like event – information here
The Spice of Life, 6 Moor Street, Soho, London, WC1 5NA, England, Sunday 23rd September 2018, 8.00pm (part of the ‘Secret Rapture’ gig with Daniel Paul Baxter, Henry Grace and Nick Ereaut) – pay-what-you-like event – information here
Luna Lounge, 7 Church Lane, Leytonstone, London, E11 1HG, England, Friday 28th September 2018, 8.00pm (with The Islas and The Blue Spiders) – pay-what-you-like event – information here

* * * * * * * *

Also this month – vocal music showcase label La La La Records are starting up the Pindrop Sessions, a series of acoustic/unplugged music shows at the Brixton Pound Cafe. First up in the series is a duo gig by a pair of longstanding collaborators – a tale of two Alices.

An inspiring blend of folk-culture conduit, benevolent diva, teacher, scholar and benefactress, singer and violinist Alice Zawadzki is a tireless musician and a warm, charismatic, enthralling performer. Almost ceaselessly active (which explains why she shows up in here so often), she moves purposefully between jazz songs, Jewish music (among other things, she’s a member of stunning Sephardic fusion ensemble Sefiroth), her own themed concerts, Joni Mitchell interpretations, film scores, string/vocals classical solo spots and much more (including a host of social programmes including teenaged-refugee support scheme Play For Progress). She also manages to be a young British national treasure with a firm international perspective; and never seems to look tired, either. How she packs it all into one life, I’ll never know.

Alice Purton, meanwhile, has been making her name as a leading young contemporary music cellist. An active member of diverse-minded ensemble Distractfold, the Plus Minus Ensemble, the Chagall Piano Quartet and Trio Artem, she’s involved in the regular performance and commissioning of new work while dipping deep into existing repertoire. Amongst other collaborations, she and Alice Z have previously worked together on the latter’s ‘Songs About The Moon’ concert and in the Cello Songs trio (which also features fellow cellist/Team Zawadzki member Shirley Smart).

There’s not too much of Alice P on the web at the moment, but here’s her playing in two trios – one performing Charlie Sdraulig’s voice/cello/shakuhachi piece ‘close’ back in 2012 and the second one also featuring Alice Z and guitarist Alex Roth, performing Alex’s trio piece ‘After’ in London last year.

Together, the two Alices will “weave together the intimate sonorities of cello and violin to create an unusual bed for their rich voices, in a program of soulful songs ranging from European folk to jazz to re-imagined pop.” This is likely to be a well-attended gig and the Pound Cafe’s a cosy space, so make sure you book a space by email before coming down.

La La La Records present:
Pindrop Sessions – Alice Zawadzki & Alice Purton
The Brixton Pound, 77 Atlantic Road, Brixton, London, SW9 8PU, England
Friday 21st September 2018, 7.30pm – information here (email to reserve your place)

Tags: A Mad Belgian (Jennifer El Gammal), Alex Roth, Alice Purton, Alice Zawadkzi, Charlie Sdraulig, London (England), Rupert Gillett

September 2018 – more Daylight Music sessions in London – The Cornshed Sisters, Mesadorm and Kadialy Kouyate (15th September); The Left Outsides, Sister Cookie and Albecq (22nd September); ‘The Sea at the End of Her String’ with Resina, Emilie Levienaise-Farrouch and Shida Shahabi (29th September)

8 Sep

Daylight Music (London’s best regular free gig series – family-friendly, but never letting that spoil or limit its sense of curiosity and enquiry) sprouts back into action again mid-month for its 2018 autumn season. The gigs in the September set are a typical Daylight melange: art-pop, roots pop, electro-acoustica, folk-pop, post-classical, Kouyate griot and ambient electronica.

* * * * * * * *

The 15th September show features The Cornshed Sisters, Mesadorm and Kadialy Kouyate.

“The Cornshed Sisters are four singer-songwriters based in Tyne and Wear, who weave together pop, folk, ballad and protest music into a unique and distinctive style. Drawing on a palette of solo and harmony vocals and a blend of acoustic and electronic instruments, they convey their stories with sensitivity and humour.

“Formed in Bristol in 2015, Mesadorm is the new collaborative project of Blythe Pepino, formerly of London art pop trio Vaults. Debut album ‘Heterogaster’ is based around ideas of family, sex, trust and disconnection, using layered rich vocal harmonies to represent these issues, resulting in a truly special and original sound.

“Kadialy Kouyate is a musician, a singer songwriter inspired by the West African Griot repertoire. Born into the great line of Kouyate Griot in Southern Senegal, Kadialy’s mesmerising kora playing and singing style have been appreciated in many prestigious venues as both a soloist and in different ensembles.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tygFh25Hpr4

* * * * * * * *

The 22nd September show features The Left Outsides, Sister Cookie and Albecq.

“The Left Outsides (Alison Cotton and Mark Nicholas) are a wife/husband duo based in London. Their atmospheric, hypnotic songs echo Nico’s icy European folk, pastoral psychedelia and chilly English fields at dawn. Their recent album, ‘All That Remains’ album continues to achieve deserved critical acclaim, having been placed as folk album of the month in ‘The Guardian’ during May and receiving regular plays on BBC6 Music and WFMU in the USA.

“Sister Cookie is a fixture of the vintage and retro music scenes in London. Having absorbed different genres of music throughout her formative years, from the juju, highlife, reggae and soul records favoured by her mother to the jazz LPs in her father’s collection, she developed a lasting passion for jazz and the blues, together with a unique sound and charisma.

“Albecq is the project of three London-based experimental artists and composers – Angus MacRae, James Jones, and Thom Robson. The collective was formed in late 2016 based on a love of vintage synths, unhurried free-flowing soundscapes, and the pioneering ambient expeditions of Basinski and Stars Of The Lid.”

https://soundcloud.com/cardinaldistro/the-left-outsides-the-yellow-wallpaper

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The 29th September show is the collective concert ‘The Sea At The End Of Her String’, showcasing the work of four post-classical female composer/performers on FatCat Records’ 130701 imprint: Resina, Emilie Levienaise-Farrouch and Shida Shahabi. (As previously posted, this last gig is part of a late September tour which also takes in Brighton, Bristol and Faversham.)

“Resina is the alias of Karolina Rec, a cellist and composer based in Warsaw, Poland. A compulsive live artist, Karolina’s style is primarily characterized by personal language of improvisation and alternative approach to melody.

“Emilie Levienaise-Farrouch is an award-winning French pianist/composer currently living in London. Spanning film score, bespoke composition and sound design, her work is connected by its high quality and its evocative, meticulous craft – a common sensibility of elegant, instinctual composition.

“Shida Shahabi is a Swedish-Iranian pianist/composer and is currently based in Stockholm. She has made site-specific sound installations, plays in bands and writes music both solo and for dance, film, theatre and fine art contexts. Her debut album is set for release in 2018.”

* * * * * * * *

All gigs are at the usual place – Union Chapel, 19b Compton Terrace, Islington, London, N1 2UN, England – and are free, but chuck a fiver in the bucket to keep things going. Dates below:

Daylight Music 287: The Cornshed Sisters + Mesadorm + Kadialy Kouyate – Saturday 15th September 2018, 12:00pm – information
Daylight Music 288: The Left Outsides + Sister Cookie + Albecq – Saturday 22nd September 2018, 12:00pm – information
Daylight Music 289: The Sea at the End of Her String: Resina + Emilie Levienaise-Farrouch + Shida Shahabi, Saturday 29th September 2018, 12:00pm – information

Details on October Daylight concerts to follow in due course…

Tags: Albecq, Angus Macrae, Arctic Circle (promoter), Blythe Pepino, cello music, Daylight Music (event), Emilie Levienaise-Farrouch, James Jones, Kadialy Kouyate, listening to women, London (England), Mesadorm, piano music, Resina (Karolina Rec), Shida Shahabi, Sister Cookie, The Cornshed Sisters, The Left Outsides, Thom Robson

September 2018 – women singing (in London, mostly, and Cambridge) – Ana Silvera (15th), Susanna Wallumrød (27th), Hear Her Sounds evening with The Butterfly Wheel, Mary-Grace Dineen and Imogen Bliss (19th)

4 Sep

In Cambridge on, the 15th, there’s a repeat performance for Ana Silvera’s ‘Oracles’ song cycle, following its appearance at the South Bank Centre back in July, where Ana was bolstered by a Kate Church/Alice Williamsondance film, a folk-jazz string trio, piano, percussion and the multi-instrumental/singing skills of Listenpony’s Josephine Stephenson. The Cambridge show’s stripped down (just Ana and Josephine this time, and perhaps the dance film) but should still deliver. Beautifully crafted and sung, it’s an Anglo-Portuguese meditation and discussion of familial bereavement (Ana’s mother and brother) and of the shifting landscapes of migration. Originally conceived to have a choral sound and scape, it draws “on folk tales and myths to chart a transformative journey from profound grief to tentative acceptance.”

The last time around, I suggested that it was “a wide-spectrum take on adult pop without a trace of that genre’s unnecessary blandening: an as-it-happens assessment of the dramatic personal shifts in position following the loss of both loved ones and of the relationship one has with them while they’re alive. What I’ve heard of it so far suggests a similar vivacity as her songs elsewhere on album or in her theatrical work – vividly characterized narratives of internal reflection and of landscapes both physical and emotional, mingling detailed, nakedly honest personal verbal imagery and an influx of Portuguese folk feel in a way which makes (Ana) sound a little like an Iberian Jane Siberry.”

In London on the 27th, Norwegian singer Susanna Wallumrød plays her only British show of 2018. Originally – during the mid-Noughties – her ghostly, questioning, sighing vocal originally fronted The Magical Orchestra’s Nordic-jazz/ambient-pop reinventions of assorted pop, country and rock standards. Since then she’s moved on to other collaborations – with holy-meditative jazz pianist Tord Gustavsen; with boundary-running song experimentalist Jenny Hval; and in particular with baroque harpist Giovanna Pessi (who’s contributed to three of her seven solo albums). Along with violinist Sarah-Jane Summers and accordionist Frode Haltli, Giovanna will be performing at this London concert, which showcases Susanna’s newest album ‘Go Dig My Grave’.

Post-Magical Orchestra, Susanna’s kept up her role as re-interpreter. While the majority of her solo albums (up to and including 2016’s consummate ‘Triangle’), have featured her own songs, her ongoing work is littered with cool-toned covers, reworkings, reframings. Songs by Sandy Denny, Thin Lizzy, ABBA, Prince, Nico, Will Oldham and others were cultivated on 2008’s ‘Flower Of Evil’; while her 2011 collaboration with Giovanna and fellow baroque/Early Music musicians Marco Ambrosini and Jane Achtman provided parallel takes on Nick Drake, Henry Purcell and Leonard Cohen.

‘Go Dig My Grave’ builds on this inquisitive, restaging impetus, with Susanna’s original pieces cheek-by-jowl with her takes on “Charles Baudelaire to Joy Division, English folk to American blues, a seventeenth-century lament by Purcell to Lou Reed’s Perfect Day” , all blended with “echoes of traditional music, baroque classics and dark ambient sounds.” It’s a project of timeshifts: or, more accurately, of superimposed time, in which songs and stylings of different eras interpenetrate and merge in spellbinding manner.

Dates:

Ana Silvera: ‘Oracles’ – The Junction, Clifton Way, Cambridge CB1 7GX, England, Saturday 15th September 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here
Susanna Wallumrød: ‘Go Dig My Grave’ – Rich Mix, 35- 47 Bethnal Green Road, Shoreditch, London, E1 6LA, England, Thursday 27th September 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here

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In between – on 19th September, in London – there’s the second in Hoxton’s ongoing ‘Hear Her Sounds’ evenings; a semi-acoustic live event in a small space, with cocktails, vegan snacks, all-female lineups and organisers/initiators The Butterfly Wheel as regulars, aimed at supporting emerging female musicans. (The first one slipped my attention back in July. That was a shame, featuring as it did Margot Weidemann’s desert-sparse psych-folk project Daisy Oracle and the “twist(ing) song structure(s), striking hallucinatory lyrics, and unexpected radiophonic sounds” of former Joanna And The Wolf frontwoman Johanna Glaza.)

Alongside the Wheel-ers, mandolinist/singer/loop-stationeer Imogen Bliss played support at The Mantis Opera’s August gig last month at Paper Dress. Now, as then, you can expect to hear her weaving together songs from the East and the West: delivering slender, sparkling arrangements of old pop hits from hither and yon, plus original songs and layered one-woman folk chorales with Romani, Armenian and Balkan origins.

A few examples are below, along with a couple from by billmate Mary-Grace Dineen. A south-east Londoner, Goldsmiths graduate and sometimes session multi-instrumentalist, Mary’s output as singer-songwriter seems to vary between zippy, polyrhythmic jazz-coustica reminiscent of Eva Abraham, Roberta Flack (or, more recently, Gabriela Eva) and sour-sweet Lauryn Hill-esque pop-reggae. Her lyrics betray restlessness, compassion and a conversational impatience with the unresponsive and the inert. It seems she’s been quiet for a few years; now she’s coming out to play again.

https://soundcloud.com/imogenbliss/ambee-dagheets
https://soundcloud.com/imogenbliss/love-cats

As for The Butterfly Wheel, they’ll be bringing their Gothic romance, their ritual chant and their vocal flair. Previously I’ve sniped a bit about the duo’s showy, overtly flowery mysticism; their self-hype, their claims of originality and experimentalism despite a transparent debt to Early Music-toting Goth-tinged forebears like Dead Can Dance or Miranda Sex Garden. But when the hype is done, and they get down to business, they do bring a new flavour to that ripe old stew.

Reading beneath the lush electrophonic drones and the climbing priestess incantations, you can draw that personal touch out of their songs like long strands of myth-soaked twine – those places where they’ve taken old bronze-age stories, boiled them down to their most archetypal juices and then infused a latterday consciousness, an active female note of resistance, a little #TimesUp and sky-father toppling amidst the bones and sinews. When I hear that peeping through, I’m sorry that I bitched…

The Butterfly Wheel and MOVI present:
Hear Her Sounds: An Evening of Live Female-Led Music featuring The Butterfly Wheel + Mary-Grace Dineen + Imogen Bliss
Matters of Vinyl Importance, 163 Hoxton Street, Hoxton, London, N1 6pJ, England
Wednesday 19th September 2018, 6.30pm – information here and here

Tags: Ana Silvera, Cambridge (England), Daisy Oracle, Frode Haltli, Giovanna Pessi, Imogen Bliss, Jane Achtman, Joanna And The Wolf, Johanna Glaza, Josephine Stephenson, Listenpony, London (England), Marco Ambrosini, Mary-Grace Dineen, Sarah-Jane Summers, Susanna Wallumrød, The Butterfly Wheel

September 2018 – upcoming English post-classical gigs – Emilie Levienaise-Farrouch, Resina and Shida Shahabi join forces for ‘The Sea At The End Of Her String’ in Brighton, Bristol, London and Faversham (27th-30th September)

3 Sep

Raising little eddies in various coastal or tidal towns in southern England at the end of the month – here’s an evening of female post-classical artists: piano, cello, electronics and voices.

“Having existed since 2001, the FatCat Records imprint 130701 label was set up (at a time way before it became popular or even recognised as a genre) as an outlet for new music based around artist’s using classical instrumentation in new, non-classical ways, and became a home to some of the most recognisable names in the now broad-reaching post-classical field, introducing the likes of Max Richter and Hauschka, as well as becoming a home for pianist/composers Dustin O’Halloran and Johann Johannsson.

“In the last few years, the imprint has renewed itself and expanded its scope, signing a number of new artists and becoming a full-time concern. This year, the label’s first four album releases all come from female artists and we are excited to introduce three of those on this four-date tour.

An award-winning French pianist and composer currently based in London, Emilie Levienaise-Farrouch’s musical practice also spans film score, bespoke composition and sound design. Her work is connected both by its high quality and its evocative, meticulous craft – a common sensibility of elegant, instinctual composition.

“Having studied a Masters degree in composition at Goldsmiths whilst working for three years at online electronic store Bleep, these experiences show through in Emilie’s music, described by ‘Tiny Mix Tapes’ as “stunning… rich in reverb and resonance, sublime in the language its piano articulates, limned beautifully by orchestral and electronic ambience… melodic, graceful, eloquent, compelling.” ‘Exclaim!’ described Emilie as “quickly establishing herself as an important new voice in contemporary music. Her compositions for piano, viola, cello and electronics combine tender solo performances with rousing arrangements… Her exacting style produces a fully formed, gorgeously crafted result. Levienaise-Farrouch is one to watch.”

“Resina is the alias of Karolina Rec, a Warsaw-based cellist and composer and a compelling live artist. Karolina’s style is characterized by personal language of improvisation and an alternative approach to melody, using non-obvious characteristics of the instrument alongside electronics and her stunning voice.

“She has played throughout Europe, developing into an increasingly powerful performer supporting the likes of Sarah Neufeld, Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Owen Pallett, Hauschka and labelmate Ian William Craig. Resina’s music has been described as “haunting” by ‘The Guardian’ and “ineffably beautiful” by ‘Tiny Mix Tapes’, whilst ‘Self-Titled’ recently described her as offering a “mesmerizing take on post-classical music… that’ll leave the hairs on your neck standing straight up.”

“Shida Shahabi is a Swedish-Iranian pianist and composer currently based in Stockholm, whose debut album is set for release om 130701 this October. Shida studied piano from the age of nine and began writing melodies on the instrument as soon as she could compose with two hands. Since finishing her studies at The Royal institute of Art in Stockholm in 2013, Shida has made site specific sound installations, played in numerous different bands/constellations and written music both solo and for dance, film, theatre and fine art contexts.

“Shida signed to 130701 earlier this year, having blown the label away with the dreamy, homespun charm of her album demos. Fans of the likes of Nils Frahm, Goldmund, Dustin O’Halloran and Erik Satie will find something to fall for here.”

Dates:

Church of Annunciation, 89 Washington Street, Brighton, West Sussex, BN2 9SR, England, Thursday 27th Septemeber 2018, 8.00pm – information here, here and here
Rough Trade, Unit 3 Bridewell Street, Bristol, BS1 2QD, England,, Friday 28th September 2018, 7.30pm – information here and here
Daylight Music @ Union Chapel, 19b Compton Terrace, Islington, London, N1 2UN, England, Saturday 29th September 2018, 12.00pm (as part of Daylight Music season, autumn 2018) – information here and here
The Hot Tin, St. Saviour’s Church, Whitstable Road, Faversham, Kent, ME13 8BD, England, Sunday 30th September 2018, 7.00pm – information here

While on the subject, there’ll be more news on other upcoming Daylight Music shows shortly.

Tags: Brighton (England), Bristol (England), cello music, Daylight Music (event), Emilie Levienaise-Farrouch, Faversham (England), London (England), piano music, Resina (Karolina Rec), Shida Shahabi

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Categories 2018, 21st century classical music, acoustic music, classical fusion, cross-cultural music, crossover, electro-acoustic music, experimental music, instrumental music, loop music, New Music, post-classical, previews

September 2018 – upcoming London folk gigs – Nest Collective’s Campfire Club shows, part 1 – Curly Strings and Fran & Flora (6th September); She’Koyokh and Owl Parliament Choir (7th September); Alasdair Roberts and Counter’s Creek (14th September)

30 Aug

Here’s the first half of September’s set of Nest Collective Campfire Club open air, communal spaces shows. Info on the second half to follow in a week or so…

* * * * * * * *

The first gig, on Thursday 6th , features Curly Strings and Fran & Flora.

“Curly Strings is a four-piece band from Estonia which draws its inspiration from American bluegrass and their own personal heritage in the current Estonian cultural space. Intense and playful ensemble work, hauntingly beautiful melodies and sincere presentation of their music forms the main basis of the Curly Strings soundscape.

“Fran & Flora – a collaboration between ninja violinist Flora Curzon and folk/experimental cellist Francesca Ter-Berg – combines aspects of traditional string music and song from Eastern Europe with original compositions and improvisation. Having travelled across Europe to study with many great masters of Eastern European Roma and Klezmer music Fran & Flora perform this repertoire incorporating their own unique arrangements creating a sound that is both timeless and contemporary. They captivate their audiences with soulful laments, exquisite songs, irresistible dance tunes, and tales of their musical adventures.”

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One day later, there’s a joint show for klezmer aces She’Koyokh and the Owl Parliament Choir…

“Since bursting on to the kletzmer and Balkan music scene in the early noughties, busking at London’s East End markets, the outstanding She’Koyokh has been at the forefront of UK’s world music scene, releasing four critically acclaimed studio albums, bringing the stunning polyphonic melodies and intricate rhythms of Bulgaria and Macedonia, treasured songs and kolos from Serbian villages, exhilarating Gypsy dances from the Romanian mountains and the Jewish music of Eastern Europe to new stages, venues, radio stations and audiences.

“Owl Parliament Choir are a south London community choir, a group of friends and misfits united by their gleeful spirits, love of singing and feverish pursuit of the natural high induced by making music together. Led by Greg Staw, the choir’s repertoire is as wide as the eyes of the owls therein: Bulgarian folk songs, classical and contemporary compositions, English madrigals and original arrangements of pop classics. Anything with a soul is carefully brought to life and imaginatively crafted into colourful performances.”

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The 14th September gig features Alasdair Roberts and Counter’s Creek.

“Alasdair Roberts is one of a rare breed of musicians whose work has found favour with aficionados of both experimental/avant-garde music and traditional/folk music – as such, he has been the cover star of both Wire Magazine and fRoots Magazine. He is primarily a songwriter/composer, singer and acoustic fingerstyle guitarist as well as an interpreter/arranger of traditional songs and ballads from Scotland and beyond.

“Originally performing and releasing as Appendix Out, Alasdair began a formal solo career under his own name in 2001, and in 2013 became a member of the Scottish/English folk group The Furrow Collective (who’ve released two albums on Hudson Records and won the accolade of Best Group in the 2017 BBC Radio Two Folk Awards). Over the years, Alasdair has collaborated with a wide variety of fellow musicians such as Will Oldham, Jason Molina, Josephine Foster, Mairi Morrison and Karine Polwart; as well as with other artists including poet Robin Robertson, puppeteer Shane Connolly of Sokobauno Puppet Theatre and film-maker Luke Fowler.

“Counter’s Creek is an acoustic folk trio based in London who make original music inspired by the folk music of the British Isles and beyond. Jigs, reels, grooves from Eastern Europe and West Africa, catchy melodies with closely interwoven harmonies allied to a real sense of swing and dance energy.

“Fiddler Tom Newell is known for his work with Effra, The Ceilidh Liberation Front, Alex Mendham & His Orchestra and assorted pop acts, and also plays banjo and mandolin (not to mention charango and mouth harp). Guitarist Moss Freed plays with jazz/folk group Flekd, the Spike Orchestra, has recently recorded for John Zorn’s Tzadik label and is currently researching a PhD at Hull University. Whistle player Jonathan Taylor has worked in many different musical genres: best known as a jazz pianist who’s played with artists such as Pee Wee Ellis, Fred Wesley, Ruby Turner and various British jazz luminaries, he’s also co-founder of Tango Siempre, appeared on Strictly Come Dancing and arranged music for Robert Wyatt. Three musicians from very different backgrounds, united by a love of acoustic folk music, great tunes and earthy dance grooves.”

* * * * * * * *

Full dates:

Campfire Club: Curly Strings + Fran & Flora – Kindred Studios, 18 Saltram Crescent, West Kilburn, London, W9 3HW, England, Thursday 6th September 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here
Campfire Club: She’Koyokh + Owl Parliament Choir – (secret location t.b.c.), London, England, Friday 7th September 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here
Campfire Club: Alasdair Roberts + Counter’s Creek – Glengall Wharf Garden, 64 Glengall Road, Peckham, London, SE15 6NF, England, Friday 14th September 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here

Tags: Alasdair Roberts, Campfire Club (event), Counter's Creek, Curly Strings, Flora Curzon, Fran & Flora, Francesca Ter-Berg, Jonathan Taylor, London (England), Moss Freed, Owl Parliament Choir, She’Koyokh, The Nest Collective (event/promoter), Tom Newell

September 2018 – more Woodburner world/acoustica/pop sessions at Dalston Eastern Curve Gardens – Rum Buffalo Trio, Joe Corbin and Lorkin O’Reilly (4th September); M w S, Boe Huntress and Equal Echo (11th September); The Age Of Luna, Marine and Desert Rain (18th September); Choro Alvorada, Max Baillie and Li Alba (25th September)

27 Aug

More outdoor summer Woodburner gigs at Dalston Eastern Curve Garden, as the season moves into its final month: holding autumn at bay while it can.

* * * * * * * *

The 4th September show features festival legends Rum Buffalo, bluesman Joe Corbin, and touring NYC artist Lorkin O’Reilly.

“Rum Buffalo fornicate with forgotten songs. They mingle in many genres but feed off the rich antique roots of swing and moody blues infiltrated with hip hop beats and filthy synth lines. It’s a surreal, vaudevillian show with outrageous costumes, twisted vocal harmonies, powerful beats and outrageous horn sounds. On the night expect a stripped-off trio show, revealing the core of their beastly natures.

“Joe Corbin is a blues and soul musician from South London. An accomplished guitarist, powerful singer, and true performer, watching Joe play is bound to blow you away.

“Since arriving in Hudson, NY from his native Scotland, Lorkin O’Reilly has been making a name for himself on the New York folk scene with his delicate guitar technique and deft lyricism. This year has seen him share stages with the likes of Charlie Parr, Nadia Reid, Willy Mason, Mick Flannery and Ciaran Lavery. His debut album ‘Heaven Depends’ was released on 24th August on Team Love Records.”

https://youtu.be/MTPYi9OLNO8

* * * * * * * *

The 11th September gig features R&B/soul collective M w S, North London songstress Boe Huntress, and new electronic collaboration Equal Echo.

“M w S is a London-based duo formed in Italy in 2013. Their musical influences are artists from soul, R&B and nu-soul (such as Erykah Badu and Lauryn Hill) mixed with contemporary neo-jazz artists like Tom Misch and Masego and electro-influenced artists like Vallis Alps and Louis Matters. Their first EP ‘Swim’ is a mix of pop, contemporary R&B and nu-soul with lyrics that sometimes recall their home country; their latest release, Island, produced by Grammy-award winning London producer Aamir Yaqub (Rihanna, Ne-yo) is a soulful chilled track full of tropical and summery vibes. M w S are currently working on their next EP, due out in 2019.

“Boe Huntress grew up in Kent, playing and writing music from an early age. Her first job was writing songs for an online magazine, reviewing video games in song-form: a crash course in the art of songwriting, recording and producing, as well as in receiving immediate response to her work online. Studying Literature at university, Boe was inspired by both myth and feminism: beginning to play live, she was soon chosen by the IC Music Network as one of twelve up-and-coming artists to tour across Europe.

“Boe’s debut EP, ‘A Female Power’, is an earthy, epic debut reminiscent of both Kate Bush and Bjork. The EP is inspired by four female mythological figures (“we’ve been deprived of certain ways of seeing woman – this EP is an exploration of the darker, more unexplored aspects…”) and Boe’s taken it one step further by creating an immersive audio-visual show alongside the record. The EP is brought to life onstage by Aletta Dina on drums and Melanie Powell on synths and electronics, while Boe fronts the band with her raw, ethereal vocal and electric guitar.

“Equal Echo is a new collaboration from Londoners Hector Plimmer (DJ and producer/creator of last year’s acclaimed ‘Sunshine’ album of broken beat, trip hop, instrumental soul and field recordings) and Alexa Harley (fellow producer, songwriter and collaborating singer for Hybrid Minds, Tom Misch and Mt. Wolf). The pair initially started working together with a one-off collaboration in mind: however, once they started, it soon became clear this would be more than just a feature project. For the last year-and-a-half Harley and Hector have been meeting two days a week, almost every week, creating music that shares an equal input of musical ideas from one another.

The amalgamation of styles and musical backgrounds blend together to make a sound unlike either Harley or Hector produce alone, whilst still retaining the best attributes from both. Not only are they musical partners, they are also best friends. Over the last two years the dynamic live show has been previewed at Archspace and Ghost Notes, with their premier festival appearances at Brainchild and Glastonbury Festivals.”

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The last show, on 18th September, features London-based hip hop/R&B trio The Age Of Luna, sensual pop mythologists Marine and atmospheric Finnish world-folkers Desert Rain.

“The Age of Luna – “average joes with powerful minds” – number Butch Arkas, his schoolmate Kyote Noir and singer/saxophonist Daniella Wizard. Each brings their own influences and sensibilities to the table, and the end results reflect not just the four different musical personalities but the blend of tradition and technology that saw them get together in the first place. Despite their relative youth, the band has played over a hundred shows with festival plays at the likes of Glastonbury, Wireless, Secret Garden party and Live At Leeds. Their debut, self-titled album was released earlier this year to great acclaim and the band are busy working on new music due for release later this year.

“London-based Marine – formed in 2014 by Cara Sebastian (vocals and guitar), Beth Dariti (bass) and Kaja Magsam (drums), and described by ‘The Line Of Best Fit’ as “the musical equivalent of a creamy post-coital blush” – have just released their debut album ‘Fable Electric’, via The Vinyl Factory (following the beguiling singles Mount Olympus and Sirens).

“Produced by Rob Ellis (Anna Calvi, PJ Harvey, Cold Specks), ‘Fable Electric’ is an album that brims with exploratory wonder and bridges the gaps between spectral pop, dreamy grunge and ambient folk. Both wild and elegant, it is framed by intuitive beats, bass hypnosis that playfully counters melody, and a deep love of contrast. The vocal lines braid together over hooky guitar lines in a complex plait of old and new, understated and operatic, light and dark. The songs of Marine crystallized from mythology and fables, mingling with personal words and emotions to form tales of the ordinary and extraordinary. Their songs reference the underworld, seal demons, mighty Kraken, werewolves, witches and Gods, and even question the very nature of storytelling itself.

“Jyväskylä quintet Desert Rain are songwriter Ville Lähdepolku on guitar and vocals, Alex Lee on drums, Farshad Sanati on santour and vocals, Petri Pentikäinen on tabla and darbouka, and Ville Määttä on bass, keyboards, voice and a cluster of international wind instruments including Armenian duduk. They play hypnotic world-folk music that tends towards the mystic. From Finland to Dalston Eastern Curve Garden, just for you.”

https://soundcloud.com/user-140301247/nay-zam

* * * * * * * *

The last show, on 25th September, features choro band Choro Alvorada, international violin virtuoso Max Baillie, and the Latin-inspired songwriter Li Alba.

“Choro Alvorada is a London-based group who play Brazilian choro music of all styles, including lesser-known works and original compositions. Choro emerged in Rio de Janeiro in the late nineteenth century as a mixture of European harmony with African rhythm and improvisation, in a similar way to jazz and ragtime. The name comes from the Portuguese verb “chorar”, which means “to cry”, and indeed choro music certainly has its fair share of tear-inducing laments. But choro is mostly known for its lively, playful and syncopated melodies in the traditional setting of a “roda”; that is, with musicians playing informally around the table (drinking plenty of beer – provided by the loving fans, of course!).

“Choro Alvorada have the traditional instrumentation of the ‘regional’ choro ensemble: clarinet (played by Andrew Woolf), flute (played by Rachel Hayter), 7-string guitar (played by Luiz Morais), cavaquinho (played by Jeremy Shaverin) and pandeiro (played by Alua Nascimento). They play a wide variety of styles of choro, exploring influences from all over Brazil (and London). They play with the irresistable swing of samba from the south and baião from the north-east, and even in the style of frevo, a carnival dance from the north-east! Many of the choros they play are their own compositions, so you may find a Cockney twist to them. They famously continued to play through a thunderstorm at the Curve Garden in Summer 2017, bringing a portion of the audience onto the stage with them in the style of the traditional roda.

“Maverick violinist and violist Max Baillie is truly one-in-a-million. Born to the sound of his twin sisters practising scales and argeggios, raised by his concert-cellist father and violin-teacher mother, before travelling the world and gaining a first-class degree from Cambridge University in… Politics. Apart from that short sabbatical, Max’s whole life has been music. Yet when you watch and listen, there is a spontaneity in his playing that makes you realise that in spite of all the history, education, and practise, a Max Baillie has to be born rather than made. Max-in-a-million is an international artist, having performed in Switzerland, Italy, South Africa, France, Australia and many other corners in the last twelve months, both as a concert soloist and with other projects including ZRI, who fuse sounds of Brahms with gypsy and Hungarian folk. Witness.

“Singer. Linguist. Lover of Latin, jazz and folk traditions. Voice of velvet and force of nature. Li Alba grew up in London, listening to traditional Spanish and Greek music whilst training as a classical singer. Graduating from Guildhall juniors in music and RADA in acting, she fell away from opera and into wild Easter European theatre arts, as a professional member of the Gardzienice Theatre Company. Partaking in independent arts projects around the world she has worked through music and staged mediums with global practitioners including Katie Mitchell, Mark Ravenhill, James Brennan and Julian Maynard Smith.

“Li has contributed to London’s night life scene by supporting in the launches of two venues, Kansas Smitty’s and Juju’s Bar & Stage, and is now embarking on her solo career with a plethora of musicians with global flavours and feels. She is accompanied by guitarist Telmo Souza who has played for Rhythms Of The City and Ines Loubet (amongst many others), and who leads the astonishing Afro-samba ensemble Caravela.”

* * * * * * * *

All events are at Dalston Eastern Curve Garden, 13 Dalston Lane, Dalston, London, E8 3DF, England on Tuesday evenings. Dates below:

Rum Buffalo Trio + Joe Corbin + Lorkin O’Reilly – Tuesday 4th September 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here
M w S + Boe Huntress + Equal Echo – Tuesday 11th September 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here
The Age of Luna + Marine + Desert Rain – Dalston Curve Garden – Tuesday 18th September 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here
Choro Alvorada + Max Baillie + Li Alba – Dalston Curve Garden – Tuesday 25th September 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here

Tags: Alexa Harley, Alua Nascimento, Andrew Woolf, Boe Huntress, Choro Alvorada, Desert Rain, Equal Echo, Finland, Hector Plimmer, Jeremy Shaverin, Joe Corbin, Li Alba, London (England), Lorkin O'Reilly, Luiz Morais, M w S, Marine, Max Baillie, Rachel Hayter, Rum Buffalo Trio, Telmo Souza, The Age Of Luna, viola music, violin music, Woodburner (event/promoter)

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Categories 2018, acoustic music, acoustic pop, Afrobeat, choro, club music, cross-cultural music, crossover, dance music, dance pop, DIY music, downtempo, dream pop, electro-acoustic music, festivals, folk music, folk-jazz, folk-pop, hip hop, instrumental music, jazz, Latin dance, Malian music, neo-soul, pop, previews, R&B, rapping, rock, roots music, singer-songwriter, soul, trip hop, world & indigenous music, worldbeat

August 2018 – upcoming London eclectic gigs – strange and compelling folk, pop, and improvisatory strands from L’Ocelle Mare, Daniel O’Sullivan and Cucina Povera at the Dentist (28th August)

24 Aug

There’s an intriguing multi-genre show coming up at the Dentist in Homerton, spanning weird folk, experimental pop and some delicious electro-vocal soundscaping.

Promoter Theo is more than capable of collating and unfurling his own spiel, so here’s me passing it on with the minimum of grubby tinkering…

“…”The instrumentation is composite, rustic, yet paradoxically sophisticated: piano, 6 string bass banjo, mechanical metronome, tuning forks, claves, hand and foot clapping and tapping, mini amps, amps, subwoofer, microphones, small mix desk, bells, mouth organ fragments, concertina, componiums, “stringin it”, audio ducker, drum skins, clockwork motors…” A rare performance of the astounding music of L’Ocelle Mare is perhaps best trailed by the above instrumental inventory and the promise that Thomas Bonvalet (Powerdove/Cheval Frise) will bring forth an intense, highly syncopated and ultra-focused music from the chattering sonic menagerie it might seem to suggest. The Dentist’s cup will overflow given that the above will be prefigured by a solo appearance by Daniel O’Sullivan (Grumbling Fur/Laniakaea/This Is Not This Heat) playing what can only be described as wabi-sabi or null rotation in six-dimensional whortleberry and friends; and (in a late addition, pushing the bill in to the realms of triple headline transcendence) a live set from fabulous Glasgow based Fenno-karelian producer Cucina Povera.

“Self-taught multi-instrumentalist Thomas Bonvalet commenced his vocation as a bassist and cemented it as a guitarist at the heart of the band Cheval de Frise (1998-2004). Progressively straying from the guitar, he began to integrate foot tapping and various wind and percussive instruments into his performance, incorporating mechanical elements and stray amped-up objects into the soundscape. This formed the guiding principle of his solo project, L’Ocelle Mare, initiated in 2005, and continues to form the core of his instrumentation. In recent years Bonvalet has collaborated – most notably with Powerdove, Arlt, Radikal Satan, Jean Luc Guionnet, Arnaud Rivière, Will Guthrie, Gaspar Claus, Daunik Lazro, Fred Jouanlong and Sylvain Lemètre. Without renouncing his solo work, his interruption from it has allowed a slower and more elastic evolution, permitting ancient shapes to gradually metamorphose. In this way new compositions successively articulated themselves in an almost self-determining manner.

“‘Temps En Terre’ is the fifth album release from L’Ocelle Mare, and the first to have been recorded in a studio. The preceding releases were characterised by a marked acoustic: the echoey reverberations inherent to ‘Serpentement’ were thanks to the Protestant temple it was recorded in; ‘Engourdissement’ was entirely recorded in forest expanses, upon ponds and enclosed within remote wood cabins; ‘Porte d’Octobre’ was recorded entirely in urban spaces; and his first, unnamed album was entirely recorded in caves and churches. The release of ‘Serpentement’ in 2012 marked the end of a cycle of four progressive stages, homogeneous but distinct from one another, released with successive regularity, proceeding with the elaboration of his singular set up, implicating the human body into a simultaneity of associated gestures and sonic tools and forming a commonality of timbres and tremors. This structure remained fluid and adaptable, finding a balance which lent itself quite naturally to collaborations, entering into the fields of improvisation, folk, rock and contemporary music. The pieces forming ‘Temps en Terre’ however, are recorded under a harsher gaze, presented in far cruder light, comparable to that of a live recording.

“Daniel O’Sullivan is a London-based composer and multi-instrumentalist. Working across of range of musics and artistic platforms he has made a strong impact on the international avant community. Whether solo or in his varied collaborative projects, O’Sullivan’s work is remarkable in the way it infuses familiar everyday experience with traces of the uncanny, the secret and the magickal. Traces of his many projects all meet and mingle in his most recent album ‘VELD’: from his solo music as Mothlite to the lysergic songcraft and space-time vortices of Grumbling Fur and Laniakea, the reality-distorting zones of Æthenor and Ulver, the electronic pop of Miracle (with Zombi synth maestro Steve Moore), and his recent involvement with another pioneering London group, This Is Not This Heat.

“Released in June 2017 on Tim Burgess’ curated imprint O Genesis Recordings, ‘VELD’ is one of O’Sullivan’s most immediate and moving pop albums to date; yet one that’s strikingly dense and allusive, alive with enticing sonic diversions, hypnotic mantras and eerie biomechanical rhythms.

“Glasgow-based musician Maria Rossi, a.k.a. Cucina Povera, has named her project after a style of southern Italian traditional cooking associated with precarity and making-do; a philosophy of simplicity and stoicism that applies perfectly to the spare but beautiful music Rossi experiments with. Marrying minimal synth, field recordings and the hymnal dexterity of Rossi’s vocal performances, it creates a new language, sometimes literally, to be spoken in some mythological Fourth World we’ve yet to create.”

https://soundcloud.com/cucinapovera/sokerihyhma
https://soundcloud.com/cucinapovera/avainsyoppo

L’Ocelle Mare + Daniel O’Sullivan + Cucina Povera
The Old Dentist, 33 Chatsworth Road, Homerton, London, E5 0LH, England
Tuesday 28th August 2018, 7.30pm – information here and here

Tags: Cheval de Frise, Cucina Povera (Maria Rossi), Daniel O’Sullivan, L’Ocelle Mare, Thomas Bonvalet

August 2018 – upcoming London jazz gigs – a few young women’s shows – Tomorrow’s Warriors Female Frontline (29th August); Romarna Campbell Trio (29th August); B L A N (C) A N V A S (30th August)

23 Aug

Following up the Jazz Herstory post last month, here’s a little more brief word-spreading about young female jazz action in the capital:

“Tomorrow’s Warriors Female Frontline developed out of the award-winning Tomorrow’s Warriors Emerging Artist Development Programme based at the Southbank Centre. This youthful all-women ten-piece jazz ensemble embodies the Warrior spirit in more than just serious musical talent. Playing a selection of upbeat jazz standards, funk and contemporary versions of some well-known classics from the likes of Kenny Garrett, Roy Hargrove and Freddie Hubbard, the Female Frontline is led by saxophonist Aleksandra Topczewska under the tutelage of Gary Crosby OBE.

“The rest of the Frontline is Loucin Moskofian (vocals), Kasia Kawalek (vocals/flute), Lettie Leyland (trumpet), Beth Hopkins (alto saxophone), Jelly Cleaver (guitar), Roella Oloro (keyboards), Izzy Burnham (bass guitar and double bass), Caroline Scott (drums) and Alana Curtis (percussion). For this evening they will be joined by special guest vocalist Cherise Adams-Burnett, who also went through the Tomorrow’s Warriors programme.”

TWLive presents:
Tomorrow’s Warriors Female Frontline
The Spice Of Life, 6 Moor Street, Soho, London, W1D 5NA, England
Wednesday 29th August 2018, 8.00pm – information here and here

* * * * * * * *
With that crucial first year of study at jazz hothouse Berklee College of Music now under her belt, emerging young Birmingham-born drummer, composer and bandleader Romarna Campbell is home for a while, but isn’t resting. Instead, she’s taking out two different ensembles (both led from the drum set, and drawing strongly on the Birmingham jazz talent base) to pursue her own current musical vision of “explosive moments, combined with quiet thoughtfulness inspired by a deep-rooted influence of bebop, hip-hop and neo-soul.”

Of these, her Romarna Campbell Trio also includes Ed Riches on guitar and Kokoroko bassist Mutale Chashi, and provides compositional space for all three. Her larger quintet B L A N (C) A N V A S features two tenor saxophonists (Xhosa Cole and Scottish sometime-looper Harry Weir), pianist David Austin Grey and bass guitarist Wayne Matthews.

Dates:

The Romarna Campbell Trio – Ghost Notes, 95a Rye Lane, Peckham, London, SE15 4ST, England, Wednesday 29th August 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here
Live at Jazz re:freshed: B L A N (C) A N V A S – Mau Mau Bar, 265 Portobello Road, Notting Hill, London W11 1LR, England, Thursday 30th August 2018, 7.45pm – information here and here

Sorry that I’m short on much in the way of musical examples, since Romarna hasn’t recorded much on or off camera (though, if you like, you can take a listen to the tribal-house-influenced dance music which she records away from her main jazz work); but I do have this footage of a previous version of the Trio taking on a Miles Davis tune, and a few very murky videos of B L A N (C) A N V A S at work.

https://youtu.be/1GTB4R53-mk
https://youtu.be/CSgo4RhSmyM
https://youtu.be/OgtFrs7AHAw

Tags: Alana Curtis, Aleksandra Topczewska, B L A N (C) A N V A S, Berklee School Of Music, Beth Hopkins, Birmingham (England), Caroline Scott, Cherise Adams-Burnett, David Austin Grey, Ed Riches, Gary Crosby, Harry Weir, Izzy Burnham, Jelly Cleaver, Kasia Kawalek, Lettie Leyland, listening to women, London (England), Loucin Moskofian, Mutale Chashi, Roella Oloro, Romarna Campbell, Romarna Campbell Trio, Tomorrow's Warriors, Tomorrow’s Warriors Female Frontline, Wayne Matthews, Xhosa Cole

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Categories 2018, acoustic music, bebop, cross-cultural music, funk, hip hop, jazz, jazz-funk, neo-soul, post-bop, previews

August 2018 – upcoming London pop and rock gigs – The Mantis Opera, Bozo Zoo, The Butterfly Wheel and Imogen Bliss (25th August); Norwood & Brixton Foodbank fundraiser with Treasure Of Woe, Carl White and Apocalypse Jazz Unit (also 25th August)

15 Aug

There are several reasons that I’ve been following the exploits of The Mantis Opera this year. One is the music: an illuminating synth-rock rush through cunningly orchestrated post-classical complexity and brainiac alternative pop, topped with similarly cerebral lyrics which slide fizzing, thinking ribbons through philosophy, logic and linguistic theory before binding them back into more down-to-earth life situations.

If this sounds hideously dry or snooty, it isn’t. This is simply music which is neither ashamed of its own cleverness, nor too self-absorbed or chilly to invite you along for the ride. They’re among an increasing number of newish, bumping-along-in-the-underground acts who share this kind of quirky enthusiasm and possess the requisite smarts and chops to back it up. Tom O.C. Wilson, Prescott, Thumpermonkey and Lost Crowns spring immediately to mind: bands and songwriters who see nothing wrong with turning out songs with the depth and twists of playful short stories, of compressed novels-of-ideas or of meandering Flann O’Brien-esque digressions.

As regards The Mantis Opera, I’ve been chucking around terms like “wide-awake brain music” and “avant-prog keeping watch from under a dream-pop veil” and I’m not going to drop those yet, although I might have to come up with a few more if the band are going to keep up regular performances.

The other reason that I’m keeping an eye on The Mantis Opera is that they tend to keep interesting gig company. Whether they’re good at being invited or are inordinately good at charming their way into lineups, the band seem to have a knack for fitting onto a wide variety of different bills, and this end-of-the-month gig at Paper Dress Vintage is no exception.

Two summers old, already pegged as “rust-bucket swing” and compared to “Mark E. Smith manning the Hot Five”, Bozo Zoo play rootsy jazz-folk and rhythm & blues on drums, double bass and comfortably sleazy sax. Hollering, theatrical vocalist and off-the-wall lyricist Mark Warren (who also handles the inevitable, ubiquitous ukulele) ensures that they tilt into a similar realm of bulging-vein vigour and twisted circus berserkery to that of The Tiger Lillies. A few decades ago he was bobbing about in the kind of lucky-dip underground bands that showed up on Org Records compilations: now he’s singing up budding cabaret gallimaufries of music hall songs and ditties about chess grandmasters. On top of all this, Bozo Zoo seem to have fused Spinal Tap with Schrödinger, via recent online mutterings about “a new drummer but we’ve also kept our drummer… but it ain’t a band with two drummers… but we have got two drummers… it’s complicated.”

Hailing from east London and extensively festooned with mysticism, The Butterfly Wheel aren’t quite the esoteric revelation that they’d like to make out. Plenty of their surface schtick – the Gothic theatrical trappings, the Early Music dirge-wails, the stripping away of Western pop tropes in favour of frowning middle-continent antiquity – is more than familiar to anyone with a passing knowledge of Dead Can Dance (or of the host of intense, tousled imitators DCD spawned over three decades). What is refreshing is the shifts underneath those surface. A female duo, their songs reshuffle and transform archetypes for an increasingly feminised new time. There’s the sense of old stone patriarchal gods and legends being chipped away at; of more hopeful alternatives being birthed out of the sea; of the stories sitting up and rewriting themselves. We’ll have to see where it leads.

From Camberwell and Coldharbour, Imogen Bliss reshuffles Eastern European folk songs and tufty pop covers on voice, mandolin and loop station. The examples below are Armenian and Balkan/Romani, sandwiching a reworked Cure hit: the latter may not sound a great deal different to those pixiedreamgirl uke songs which still bog down every other cinema advert, but Imogen sounds awake and illuminated rather than sun-drenched and casually dreamy. I’m guessing that she’s got other tricks up her sleeve…

https://soundcloud.com/imogenbliss/bella-sum
https://soundcloud.com/imogenbliss/love-cats
https://soundcloud.com/imogenbliss/ambee-dagheets

Paper Dress Presents…
The Mantis Opera + Bozo Zoo + The Butterfly Wheel + Imogen Bliss
Paper Dress Vintage Bar & Boutique,, 352a Mare Street, Hackney, London, E8 1HR, England
Saturday, 25 August 2018, 7.45pm – information here and here

* * * * * * * *

On the same night, there’s this. Lovers of righteous noise, here’s your chance to sample some noise that’s a bit more righteous…

“London promoters Wrongpop and Chaos Theory have gotten together for a one-off special event to raise money for Norwood & Brixton Foodbank: some of the best new underground bands out there have agreed to bring you their sounds for this excellent cause, so it’ll be a phenomenal evening with extra positive vibes. 100% of ticket sales go to the charity.

“Formed from members of Long Slow Dissolve,The Love Me Tenders and Witchfist, Treasure Of Woe play stoner and psychedelic jams on guitar and drums. We’ve seen this duo doing their thing at The Facemelter last September and they just keep on recording their jams and releasing them online, so have a listen at the link and get down for the full live experience.

“Carl White are a guitar/drums experimental rock duo, originally formed in Brighton and now based in London. Over the years they’ve shared the stage with acts such as Nitkowski, Alpha Male Tea Party, Flies Are Spies From Hell, Witching Waves and The Mae Shi.They’re currently working on a new EP, from which there will be a single/video released in the next couple of months.

“Apocalypse Jazz Unit were started in 2013 by Rick Jensen as a recording project, after nearly three years of not making music. After numerous albums, Rick recruited some new and old musician buddies and started playing live. AJU quickly went from a small group to an over-the-top collective of psycho improvisers, with up to seventeen members at any one time. To date, they have released over seventy albums and have played a ton of gigs. AJU harnesses the spiritual fire of free-jazz of the ‘60s, mixed with a bit of disco when the mood takes them. Always high-energy and with a heavy sense of humour, AJU can easily swing from delicate and sombre, to full-blast horn mayhem.”

Wrongpop & Chaos Theory Music Promotions present:
Norwood & Brixton Foodbank Fundraiser: Treasure Of Woe + Carl White + Apocalypse Jazz Unit
The Black Heart, 2-3 Greenland Place, Camden Town, London, NW1 0AP, England
Saturday 25th August 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here

Tags: Apocalypse Jazz Unit, Bozo Zoo, Carl White, Chaos Theory (event/promoter), fund-raising, Imogen Bliss, London (England), The Butterfly Wheel, The Cure, The Mantis Opera, Treasure Of Woe, Wrongpop (promoters)

August 2018 – husk, rime and lanterns – a double dose of Jack Hayter in a Gravesend lightship (18th August)

14 Aug

I like the idea of a mobile arts venue. A seabound one is even better. LV21, a forty-metre decommissioned former lightship, once kept other ships from foundering on the rocks along the Kentish coast. Now it’s a floating art space and performance facility, moving intermittently between Thames estuary towns. Although it’s been resting at a long-term Gravesend mooring since summer 2016, LV21 still fits the measure for art-on-the-move (while its sister vessel, LV18, performs a similar function at a similar mooring up the coast at Harwich).

Wherever it happens to be at the time, LV21 opens up in full each summer for the overlapping International Lighthouse Lightship Weekend and International Lighthouse Heritage Weekend, allowing visitors to explore the vessel and immerse themselves in lightship and lighthouse history from around the world. Also on offer at the event this year – this weekend – are lessons in tying sailor’s knots, a soldering and radio workshop (build your own pocket amplifier and speaker) and Nicola Pollard of stripped-down drama company Up The Road Theatre inviting discussion for the next UTR production, ‘Peril At Sea’ (set to explore “stories, memories, myths and songs of smuggling, shipwrecks and survival” and to tour around English coastal towns including Lowestoft, Portsmouth and Wells-next-the-Sea).

Of course, it’s music rather than knots that’s attracting my interest. Also on hand is Jack Hayter – wandering multi-instrumentalist, onetime Hefner member, ex-Dollboy-er, Ralegh Long and Papernut Cambridge collaborator; the writer and performer of memorable contemporary folk songs and a relatively recent new Gravesend resident. He has two interesting – and very different – nautical music productions going on in the bowels of the ship.

The first of these is ‘Flashes & Occultations’, a sonic installation in the generator room comprising “a seventy-seven-minute-long sonic improvisation on lighthouse life.” It was originally released by London indie label Where It’s At Is Where You Are in 2017 as part of their ‘Seven@77‘ compilation, on which it loomed massively over the thirteen other pieces (each of them clocking in at a measly seventy-seven seconds). In typically dry and witty fashion, Jack describes it as a salvage job on a foolhardy, ambitious effort to sidestep the requested seventy-seven-minute pedal steel improvisation in favour of an attempt to make “a transient sound sculpture from the identification patterns of distant lighthouses, buoys and light vessels; to convert their flashes and occultations into small voltages using telescopes, light-sensitive resistors and photodiodes, then to use those derived signals to trigger samples and control analogue synths. I was overambitious and my experiments were largely a technical failure. I also got cold and muddy while recording foghorns. Worse still, those supposedly unique and exciting light patterns often turned out to be “one flash every twenty seconds” or “red occulting thrice every minute on a Tuesday. Then I ran out of time.”

Salvaging the project wreckage, Jack returned to the original brief – improvising on pedal steel around field recordings, stirring in documentary dialogue, eight-bit synth pads and calling in a few friends and favours to obtain further ingredients: poetry, wordless harmony singing, harmonium drones and electronic oscillator. Despite his disclaimers, he came up with an effective, charming piece – at different points lulling, humorous and lyrically haunting – which absolutely deserves its second life amongst the Gravesend solenoids and gauges, where Jack claims he might play along with it “from time to time” on live fiddle. Here’s a short excerpt with accompanying video (filmed up at the Firth of Forth) – also, if you’re curious but can’t make it down to LV21 this Saturday, here’s the whole piece in audio.

Jack’s second musical contribution of the day is the one-off free live gig he’s performing in the ship (on deck? in the hold?) during the evening, in which he’s going to be performing “a set of my songs and stories which will loosely follow the river from Deptford down to Gravesend finishing up at Margate, with diversions.” Here’s where you get to see Jack in the raw – a rangy, weatherbeaten feller with a voice as chewed-up and resilient as an ancient poster still clinging onto a seafront fence. His recent album, ‘Abbey Wood‘, is one of 2018’s under-the-radar triumphs, a compelling song collection recorded in defiantly threadbare folk fashion but with infusions of avant-garde turn-up-and-play instrumentation. Its ace in the hole, however, is Jack’s songwriter vision. As ever, he writes with a documentarian’s timing and eye for sparse, telling detail; with a poet’s knack for sifting detritus and forgotten trash to find significance; and with a determination to tell stories from those broad, deliberately ignored margins of society which actually make up its overlooked majority.

Jack’s songbook includes tales of post-war slump and of the rural working class swept into conflict; the hopes and dreams of sewage workers; the luckless POWs sunk with the SS Andora Star; the fumblings of early love under the shadow of the Cold War. Crucially – and despite his sharp, assured literacy – he always writes these from the inside and on the level, rather than as booky preachings from above. These are stories about people on lean means, living within strung-together moments: a compassionate, sometimes subtly angry cinema of life’s grain outside the slick and aspirational. They vouch and voice for the itinerate, the sidelined; the workers who just get on with it; the kids with foggy futures stirred and impelled by vast indifferent forces.

Jack’s delivery of these tales, meanwhile, is battered, warm, inclusive, strangely dignified, and mesmeric. Check out an earlier review I did of one of Jack’s previous live performances; or have a dip into the selection of tracks below.

Jack Hayter @ International Lighthouse Lightship Weekend 2018
Light Vessel 21, (currently moored at) St Andrews Quay, Royal Pier Road, Gravesend, Kent DA12 2BD, England
Saturday 18 August 2018
• ILLW full event duration: 12.00pm-11.00pm
• Flashes & Occultations installation: 12.00pm-4.00pm
• Jack Hayter free live set: 7.00pm-11.00pm
– free event – information here, here, here and here

Tags: Dollboy, Gravesend, Harwich, Hefner, International Lighthouse Heritage Weekend (event), International Lighthouse Lightship Weekend (event), Jack Hayter, lightships, Papernut Cambridge

August 2018 – upcoming gigs – Bauhaus’ David J plays solo in London and Wellingborough (25th & 26th August)

13 Aug

This week, half of goth-rock godfathers Bauhaus – in this case, sculpted singer/self-styled “myriad of colours” Peter Murphy and bass player David J – embark on the latest of their intermittent reunions: the Ruby Celebration Tour, which commemorates the original band’s fortieth anniversary (and on which they’ll perform the whole of their 1980 debut album ‘In the Flat Field’, ending up with a crowd-pleasing encore of Bauhaus classics).

Sprawling sonorously across several months in New Zealand, Australia, Europe and the UK, the tour’s probably already old news if you’re a committed member of the eager bat-chasing hordes, but full dates are available here if you want them. What you might have missed is that, in parallel to the tour, David J. is playing a couple of special solo shows.

Soft-spoken and thoughtful, David’s been regarded as one of the peacekeepers within Bauhaus’ sometimes belligerent emotional ferment, ameliorating the ongoing turbulence and “psychodrama” between Murphy and restless guitarist Daniel Ash. He was also a prime contributor to the oft-underestimated intellectual weight of the band, weaving references to Zen Buddhism, funk, art and architecture into the dark, dank, post-punk shape-throwing.

Yet aside from Bauhaus (and regardless of various reunions), he’s made a multi-faceted post-band career for himself, taking in sculpted noise, drama scoring, playwriting and fine art as well as songwriting. In addition to solo music, this has included work with The Jazz Butcher and Amanda Palmer; with Dutch downtempo trio Strange Attractor; with original Bauhaus art movement member René Halkett; and in particular with his fellow Northampton occultist Alan Moore (initially through the macabre campfire singalong of The Sinister Ducks, then a ‘V for Vendetta’ tie-in EP, and most recently and rewardingly via five albums of intricate words-and-noise psychogeographic “workings” as members of The Moon and Serpent Grand Egyptian Theatre of Marvels, digging up and expounding on weird history on location).

Both the tour with Murphy and the solo dates coincide with the early September reissue of David’s second solo album, ‘Crocodile Tears and The Velvet Cosh’. Initially released in 1985 (shortly before David re-engaged with a Murphy-less Bauhaus lineup to form alt-pop pioneers Love & Rockets) it was part of a determined move to shed the cloying Bauhaus image. Its bright semi-acoustic pop sound (with David comfortably swapped over to guitar and fronting) and its assured singer-songwriter stance had more in common with the songs of Aztec Camera or the deft wit of the Postcard Record bands, simultaneously freeing up and revealing the genuine breadth of his influences and ideas. He now remembers it as “a personal pastoral favourite… the album that really set the tone for all of my future solo endeavours.”

Of the two shows, the London performance looks like being a relatively straightforward affair. The truly committed and intrigued will need to make a pilgrimage the following day – up to the Midlands and to Wellingborough, where David will be playing a special acoustic show in Bauhaus’ original stomping ground Beck Studios, in which the band recorded much of their early work).

A limited-capacity event (with a boutique price tag), it’ll focus on songs spanning David’s career as well as songs originally recorded at Beck, and will also feature a live interview conducted by Andrew Brooksbank (author of ‘Bauhaus – Beneath The Mask’) and a Q&A session with the audience, with the whole event being recorded and filmed for later release.

Dates:

The Islington, 1 Tolpuddle Street, Islington, London, N1 0XT, England, Saturday 25th August 2018, 7.30pm – information here, here and here
‘Back to Beck’ @ Beck Studios, 2 Gisburne Road, Wellingborough, Northamptonshire, NN8 4EE, England, Sunday 26th August 2018, 8.00pm – information here and here

Tags: Andrew Brooksbank, Bauhaus (band), David J, London (England), Peter Murphy, Wellingborough (England)

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Categories 2018, acoustic music, acoustic pop, alternative pop, alternative rock, art pop, art rock, experimental/avant-garde rock, Gothic pop, Gothic rock, pop, post-punk, previews, rock, salon events, singer-songwriter, spoken word

August 2018 – upcoming London folk gigs – Nest Collective’s Campfire Club shows – Åkervinda and Night (17th August); Gasper Nali and Ellie Ford (also 17th August); London Contemporary Voices (24th August); Alabaster dePlume and Luna Silva (31st August)

12 Aug

Here’s the second set of August’s Nest Collective Campfire Club open air park/garden/playground shows…

* * * * * * * *

Another pair of simultaneous Campfire concerts are happening on 17th August, the first of which features Scandinavian vocal quartet Åkervinda and Nepali folk band Night.

“Iris Bergcrantz, Lise Kroner, Linda Bergström and Agnes Åhlund – the four singers of Åkervinda – take pride in their original and modern interpretation of the traditional folksongs of Scandinavia. The group’s name is inspired by a Swedish wildflower whose roots spread far and wide like rivers under the ground. Like the flower, gracefully entwining melodies, rock-solid groove, and ever intriguing harmonies will take root in your mind. Like the flower, they will be impossible to remove.

“Jazz singers at heart, the young women of Åkervinda share a deep love of folk music. Through improvisation, the group gives new life to traditional folk songs and stories of women throughout the ages. In 2014 they released their debut album “Kära Mor” (“Dear Mother”) and has been touring in Sweden, Denmark, the US and Canada since. Åkervinda have performed at Aarhus Vocal Festival, Malmö Arena, Hillerød Folk Festival and various folk festivals in Sweden (as well as museums and venues in Toronto, New York and Chicago) and collaborations include work with the Swedish folk musician Jens Ulvsand, the Canadian fiddle virtuoso Jaron Freeman-Fox and the internationally-renowned Swedish trio Nordic.

“Reworking Nepali traditions into “stunning new soundscapes” (‘Making Tracks’), Night is a Kathmandu-based folk band formed in 2006, with members coming together from different musical backgrounds. The band focuses on reviving lost and endangered Nepali instruments, on creating new sounds rooted in collective Nepali heritage and on reintroducing said music and instruments to a world audience.

The people, places and cultures of Nepal have been Night’s greatest inspiration. Most of the songs are composed “in the field” where the band stays with people in villages. After living with a melody, a song or a drum rhythm over a period of time, they slowly start sensing its deeper meaning; and, through developing their own compositions, try to express and share this understanding with others.”

* * * * * * * *

The second of the two 17th August concert features Malawian roots musician Gasper Nali and Brightonian folk harpist/singer-songwriter Ellie Ford.

“Performing “simple but joyous… totally infectious” music (‘Songlines’), Gasper Nali plays a Babatoni – a three-metre one-stringed home-made bass guitar – with an empty bottle and a stick, and makes the most beautiful and catchy original Afro-beats possible. Gasper is a one-man-band, with the Babatoni, cow-skin kick drum and very catchy tunes. He is absolutely unlike anything else. It’s super Malawian roots, it’s very upbeat and incredibly danceable! Or – as a Bandcamp fan nicely put it: “Gasper is a one man party! It’s completely impossible to stop moving – and just as impossible to stop smiling!”

“Ellie Ford is an alternative folk artist whose expressive vocals are accompanied by her percussive harp playing and eloquent songwriting. Her combination of classical and modern musical styles – of the serene with the guttural – makes for a captivating solo performance. With a debut album release under her belt and a second album to follow in 2018, Ellie Ford is forging her own path as an alternative musician and performer.”

* * * * * * * *

On 24th August, utility choir London Contemporary Voices deliver the second of their two Campfire concerts this year. Suppliers of “session singers, backing vocalists, choristers, beatboxers and a cappella entertainment”, LCV are an in-demand studio-and-live chorus who spend much of their time working with pop and dance artists, providing music for corporate events or singing “choireeoke”; but in between these engagements they host their own events or pursue more unorthodox projects. Beside their previous 2018 Campfire event earlier in the season, the latter have recently included providing a soundbath for Folkestone’s experimental Profound Sound festival and staging a celebration of female songwriters at Union Chapel back in May.

* * * * * * * *

The last of the August concerts comes on 31st August, and features spoken-word/instrumental polymath Alabaster DePlume and trilingual folk/jazz/pop musician Luna Silva.

”From Manchester, now based in London, Gus Fairbairn – better known as Alabaster DePlume – is a performer, writer and musician. A saxophonist with an unusual tone (reminiscent of Ethopian free-jazz legend Getatchew Mekurya), Alabaster collaborates with members of the folk and jazz scenes of London, Bristol and Manchester. He uses music and spoken word to portray sentiments, often contradictory, that together evoke a new feeling. Whether in recording, writing or performance, his work has an emphasis on inclusion, encouragement and sincerity (and was recently described on Radio 3 as being “cheerfully uneasy”).

Since 2011 Alabaster has produced three albums on Manchester label Debt Records, toured Europe as a solo performer, produced short films, and written/performed a play with circus-aerial in Dublin. His latest album, ‘Peach’, was produced by Paddy Steer, and accompanies a short film called ‘I Feel Good’ directed by Melodie Roulaud. He also regularly presents a series of combined arts events celebrating both his and others’ work.

“Daughter of an English actress, a Spanish circus performer, and raised in France Luna Silva is a daughter of the world, singing in three languages and influenced by the cultures she has come across in her travels. In a world that is increasingly connecting, communicating and cooperating; Luna Silva’s music is deeply resonant. Her music is a mixture of contemporary music and traditional musics of this world (the arrangements touching on Eastern European folk, English folk, straight pop and Congolese jazz) but above all one feels a love for creativity. Accompanied by her ukulele (or a quartet also including guitar, double bass and percussion) she takes us on a journey of our own – an acoustic set with sass.”

* * * * * * * *

Full dates:

Campfire Club: Åkervinda + Night – Lumpy Hill Adventure Playground, 15 Market Road, Lower Holloway, London, N7 9PL, England, Friday 17th August 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here
Campfire Club: Gasper Nali + Ellie Ford – Phytology, Bethnal Green Nature Reserve, Middleton Street, Bethnal Green, London, E2 9RR, England, Friday 17th August 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here
Campfire Club: London Contemporary Voices return! – Glengall Wharf Garden, 64 Glengall Road, Peckham, London, SE15 6NF, England,Friday 24th August 2018, 7.00pm – information here and here
Campfire Club: Alabaster dePlume + Luna Silva – Spitalfields City Farm, Buxton Street, Shoreditch, London, E1 5AR, England, Friday 31st August 2018, 7.00pm – information here

More Campfire Club shows to follow in September…

Tags: Alabaster DePlume, Åkervinda, Campfire Club (event), Ellie Ford, Gasper Nali, London (England), London Contemporary Voices, Luna Silva, Night, The Nest Collective (event/promoter)

August 2018 – upcoming London pop & rock gigs – Loop Pedal Lunacy with Steve Strong, Fetherstone, Alex Taylor, Sam Martin and She, Robot (8th August); plus a rare free Silvery acoustic show (10th August)

3 Aug

An evening of pop-looping at Paper Dress; and the return of some London art-pop rascals…

* * * * * * * *

First, the loopfest…

“Steve Strong is a one man arsenal of beats, tapped guitar and lush textural melodies. His music is as witheld as it is grandiose, as skeletal as it is layered, equal parts shimmering and pulsing. It glimmers, swings and explodes in all the right places, sliding gracefully from one section to another, played as tightly as it is loose and free. Steve’s ability to bridge the gap between technical ability and captivation is completely instinctual, tattoed onto his musical consciousness like the art on his body. His music seems to encompass many different styles without feeling contrived or forced; every strand of inspiration in Steve’s music is carefully placed and melted. This music will not be held down!

“As She, Robot, award winning loop artist Suzy Condrad is a seasoned performer and authentic underground artist who has written and self-produced three albums and established herself as a leader in her field, winning the title of Boss Looping UK Champion in 2011. She effortlessly juggles instruments and genres with a dynamic and arresting one-woman show which has amazed and delighted audiences from Shambala to Boomtown Fair, Bearded Theory to Beautiful Days. Dancehall, ska, doo-wop, folk and electro collide with blistering beats and haunting, sublime vocal gymnastics to take you on an ever-looping journey which balances real-time loop juggling against timeless songwriting. Edgy, raw, beatbox and bass driven sensual sounds, layered to perfection, create a mesmerising performance which is powerful yet ethereal. Woman meets machine in a musical maelstrom that will make your head spin, your spirit lift and your feet move.

“Already compared by reviewers to the likes of Bill Withers, John Martyn and Jeff Buckley, Bristol-based singer/songwriter and multi-instrumental loop pedal artist Alex Taylor is one of the shining lights of the acoustic scene and a troubadour of world-class standing. Drawing on varied influences from a wide musical spectrum, Alex’s style splices elements of soul, nu-folk and electronica to place his shape-shifting voice and dextrous, original acoustic guitar playing firmly in the spotlight. Touring extensively, Alex has notched up hundreds of gigs, sharing stages with such luminaries as Jack Savoretti, Roachford and Michael Kiwanuka: a festival favourite, he recently headlined the BBC stage at Bristol’s Harbour Festival, and has played many other stages including Cambridge Folk Festival and Cheltenham Jazz Festival. His critically acclaimed debut album features performances from members of The Invisible, Newton Faulkner’s band, Portishead and Massive Attack.

“Heavily influenced by her ninety-four-year-old artistic grandmother, Aussie-born Fetherstone brings together the quirky sounds of electronic pop and the swooping melodies of folk, and combines them with her emotive reflective story-telling. Based in London since 2015, 2017’s ‘Debut’ EP was produced and engineered by London native Harry Tarlton (Kobalt, Union J, Stooshe, WarnerUK), with the last single Two Hands On Deck hand-picked by Newton Faulker to feature on the Richer Unsigned record store day Vinyl compilation, April 2018. Fetherstone’s live shows captivate audiences using a loop/effects pedal, percussion and electronic drums. Recent performances include The Camden Assembly (supporting for Frida Sundemo), Richer Unsigned Live at Melomania, TV Nights Upstairs at Ronnie Scott’s, The Servant Jazz Quarters (supporting Ella Janes), Live at The Bedford and The Troubadour (supporting The Modern Strangers).

“Since an early age, Sam Martin has written and performed his own music around the UK, both supporting and headlining on nation wide tours. In 2010 he recorded his first independent solo EP and has since recorded three studio EPs which have gained a mass following in the UK and Europe as well as Australia and North America. With a vocal/guitar/loop-pedal musical style incorporating blues, jazz and alternative soul, Sam’s vocal and instrumental ability is testament to both his inspirations and musical evolution.”

https://youtu.be/G5oTRgBKv3Y

Loop Pedal Lunacy – A Night of Live Looping (featuring Steve Strong, Fetherstone, Alex Taylor, Sam Martin and She, Robot)
Paper Dress Vintage Bar & Boutique,, 352a Mare Street, Hackney, London, E8 1HR, England
Wednesday 8th August 2018, 8.00pm – information here, here and here

* * * * * * * *

Meanwhile, the coming week also sees the first gig in a year for London art/glam/pile-on rockers Silvery. Snatching an early night slot before the late-night jazz funk at Jazz After Dark, they’re going for a repeat performance (of sorts) of last year’s free Soho acoustic gig: this time, in order to celebrate the tenth anniversary of their debut album ‘Thunderer & Excelsior’.

Simultaneously effete and rowdy, Silvery are a wonky London pop sense made flesh, sounding as if they’ve sprung from the same zigzagging suburban allotments-of-weird which also brought up The Kinks, The Monochrome Set, Cardiacs and The Stranglers. They’re more urchin-esque than Franz Ferdinand, but less leery than Blur. They’re an erudite and wayward Carnaby Roxy; the Dodgers to Bowie’s Fagin; and as rocking goes, they’re only “garage” if said garage had started life as a spooky Victorian stable block.

In their live heyday, Silvery would dress up as Bow Street Runners and fill the capital’s little venues with sweat and joy; these days, their gigs are few and far between, so make the most of this one. If it’s anything like the last time, it’ll be just the two Silveries – Simon Harris and front guy James Orman – thwacking out the old stuff on 12-string acoustic guitar and piano. Below, to get you in the mood, there’s a couple of full-bore electric ‘Thunderer…’ excerpts plus a teaser for a forthcoming film they’ve been making.

Silvery: Live Acoustic
Jazz After Dark, 9 Greek Street, Soho, London, W1D 4DQ, England
Friday 10th August 2018, 8.00pm – free event – information here

Tags: Alex Taylor, Fetherstone, free events, London (England), Sam Martin, She Robot (Suzy Condrad), Silvery, Steve Strong

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January/February 2019 – upcoming classical gigs around Britain and Ireland – Nonclassical’s Battle of the Bands (23rd January); Scordatura’s Clara Schumann evening (3rd February); Gyða Valtýsdóttir’s ‘Epicycle’ tour (29th January to 3rd February)

January 2019 – upcoming London jazz gigs – the Sound of 2019 with Chelsea Carmichael, Nihilism and Vertaal (9th January); Alexandra Ridout in the first part of the next installment of Jazz Herstory (17th January); Steam Down invite you to be on their debut album (26th January)

January 2019 – upcoming London gigs – Monelise, Laura Victoria, Paul Reynolds and Paul Go free in Peckham; Amy Balog at the Poetry Café; The Osiris Club, Kavus Torabi and ANTA in Camden (all 9th January)

January 2019 – upcoming London jazz gigs – memories of black resistance and striving in Elaine Mitchener’s ‘Vocal Classics Of The Black Avant Garde’ (7th January) and Rufus Reid’s ‘Quiet Pride’ (29th January)

January 2019 – upcoming London classical gigs – baroque, folk and present-day music intertwine at the second Baroque At The Edge festival (4th to 6th January)

January 2019 – upcoming London folk gigs – Laboratorium Pieśni (5th January); Sincere Deceivers + Amy May Ellis (18th January); Shirley Collins in the round (31st January)

October 2018 – singer-songwriter album launches in London and Wales – Hazel Iris (25th October), Emma Lohan (25th, 26th October)

October 2018 – more Daylight Music sessions in London – Caoilfhionn Rose, Tomorrow’s Warriors StringTing and Abimaro (6th October); Terry Edwards, Seamus Beaghen, Douglas Dare and Deerful for ‘Organ Reframed’ (13th October)

October 2018 – upcoming London pop gigs – Bellatrix and Amy León; Clémentine March, Garden Party and Svetlana Smith (both 2nd October)

September 2018 – upcoming London folk gigs – Nest Collective’s Campfire Club shows, part 2 – Jim Causley and Saskia Maxwell (15th September); The Hut People and Danny Peddler & Rosie Butler-Hall (21st September); Kit Hawes & Aaron Catlow and Jake Morley (28th September)

September 2018 – upcoming London acoustic gigs – One Voice, One Cello And A Mad Belgian (14th, 19th, 23rd, 28th September); Alice Zawadzki & Alice Purton (21st September)

September 2018 – women singing (in London, mostly, and Cambridge) – Ana Silvera (15th), Susanna Wallumrød (27th), Hear Her Sounds evening with The Butterfly Wheel, Mary-Grace Dineen and Imogen Bliss (19th)

September 2018 – upcoming English post-classical gigs – Emilie Levienaise-Farrouch, Resina and Shida Shahabi join forces for ‘The Sea At The End Of Her String’ in Brighton, Bristol, London and Faversham (27th-30th September)

September 2018 – upcoming London folk gigs – Nest Collective’s Campfire Club shows, part 1 – Curly Strings and Fran & Flora (6th September); She’Koyokh and Owl Parliament Choir (7th September); Alasdair Roberts and Counter’s Creek (14th September)

August 2018 – upcoming London eclectic gigs – strange and compelling folk, pop, and improvisatory strands from L’Ocelle Mare, Daniel O’Sullivan and Cucina Povera at the Dentist (28th August)

August 2018 – upcoming London jazz gigs – a few young women’s shows – Tomorrow’s Warriors Female Frontline (29th August); Romarna Campbell Trio (29th August); B L A N (C) A N V A S (30th August)

August 2018 – upcoming London pop and rock gigs – The Mantis Opera, Bozo Zoo, The Butterfly Wheel and Imogen Bliss (25th August); Norwood & Brixton Foodbank fundraiser with Treasure Of Woe, Carl White and Apocalypse Jazz Unit (also 25th August)

August 2018 – husk, rime and lanterns – a double dose of Jack Hayter in a Gravesend lightship (18th August)

August 2018 – upcoming gigs – Bauhaus’ David J plays solo in London and Wellingborough (25th & 26th August)

August 2018 – upcoming London folk gigs – Nest Collective’s Campfire Club shows – Åkervinda and Night (17th August); Gasper Nali and Ellie Ford (also 17th August); London Contemporary Voices (24th August); Alabaster dePlume and Luna Silva (31st August)

August 2018 – upcoming London pop & rock gigs – Loop Pedal Lunacy with Steve Strong, Fetherstone, Alex Taylor, Sam Martin and She, Robot (8th August); plus a rare free Silvery acoustic show (10th August)

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