We present a two night festival of improvised music, linking up some of the most exiting British and Austrian improvisers around. Each night will have a different programme of smaller combinations plus a large group with everyone playing together.
With thanks to the Austrian Cultural Forum.
The musicians:
Steve Beresford (piano / electronics)
Tanja Feichtmair (sax)
Satoko Fukuda (violin)
Henry Lowther (trumpet)
Maggie Nichols (voice)
Mario Rechtern (sax)
John Russell (guitar)
Roger Turner (drums / percussion)
Mia Zabelka (violin / voice)
Steve Beresford (piano / electronics) UK
Internationally renowned as a free improviser Steve plays with and conducts
the London Improvisers Orchestra and has worked with hundreds of
improvising musicians, including Derek Bailey, Han Bennink, Evan Parker,
Otomo Yoshihide and John Zorn. He also works with visual artists. being a
regualr collaborator with Christian Marclay and has recently toured John
Cageʼs ʻIndeterminacyʼ with comedien Stewart Lee and pianist Tania Chen.
Awarded a Paul Hamlyn Award for Artists in 2012 Steveʼs music and his
teachings have inspired the musical community in the UK for over a decade.
Tanja Feichtmair (sax / bass clarinet) Austria
ʻI want that the auditory system learns not only the movement of the melody ,
but also the movement of the substance of the melody in musical and
spiritual space …. So that the sounds and their substance become detached
and begin to dance.ʼ
Satoko Fukuda (violin) UK
Satoko began playing violin in Japan at the age of seven, two years later
coming to England to study with Catherine Lord. Her debut was at the age of
thirteen for the Anglo Japanese Society. She has since performed and
recorded on three continents. Invited, on a full scholarship, to study at the
Yehudi Menuhin School with Natasha Boyarskaya and Lucia Ibragimova she
made her television debut in Japan as a soloist, was invited to perform at the
Wigmore Hall and Royal Opera House with her Quartet and led the Menuhin
School Orchestra broadcasting live for Classic FM and the Menuhin Festival,
touring in Switzerland and appearing at the Royal Albert and Queen Elizabeth
Halls.
Henry Lowther (trumpet) UK
During the sixties Henry was one of the first musicians on the British jazz
scene to experiment with totally free improvisation, notably with Lyn Dobson,
Jack Bruce and John Hiseman. He played with the original and seminal Mike
Westbrook band and also with John Dankworth, including playing on the now
legendary Kenny Wheeler album “Windmill Tilter” while also working on the
rock scene with Manfred Mann, John Mayall and Keef Hartley, with whom he
appeared at the Woodstock festival.
Maggie Nicols (voice) UK
Maggie has been an active participant in the European improvisational
community since joining the Spontaneous Music Ensemble in the late ’60s. A
truly original musician she is rightly seen as the UKʼs finest female
improvising vocalist. As a co-founder of the Feminist Improvising Group, she
has also worked to further women in improvised music, dancing and other
creative arts not only by example, but through workshops and extensive
collaborations including with pianist Irene Schweizer and bassist Joelle
Leandre as the trio Les Diaboliques. She also plays in Trio Blurb with John
Russell and Mia Zabelka.
Mario Rechtern (saxophone) Austria
Mario began playing flute/violin aged ten and clarinet/saxophone aged
fourteen. 1961 aged nineteen found him in Berlin where two years later he
finished highschool (theatre arts). There followed a period of stage design in
Persia and studies of its music continuing in Israel, Turkey, Germany, France,
Lux. Italy. 1972 began four years in the U.S.A studying African American
studies and palying with the Open Rehearsal Black Music Orchestra.
John Russell (guitar) UK
John Russell got his first guitar in 1965 while living in Kent and began to play
in and around London from 1971 onwards. An early involvement with the
emerging free improvisation scene (from 1972) followed, seeing him play in
such places as The Little Theatre Club, Ronnie Scottʼs, The Institute of
Contemporary Arts, The Musiciansʼ Co-Op and the London Musiciansʼ
Collective. From 1974 his work extended into teaching, broadcasts (radio
and television) and touring in the United Kingdom and, ever extensively, in
other countries around the world . He has played with many of the worldʼs
leading improvisers and his work can be heard on over 50 CDs. In 1981, he
founded QUAQUA, a large bank of improvisers put together in different
combinations for specific projects and, in 1991, he started MOPOMOSO
which has become the UKʼs longest running concert series featuring mainly
improvised music.
Roger Turner (drums / percussion) UK
Rogers pleasures & discoveries have been in
music-making with many of the finest European & international musicians in
ad-hoc & group improvising collaborations including Alan Silva, Cecil Taylor,
Henry Grimes, Derek Bailey, Evan Parker, Keith Rowe, Toshinori Kondo,
Irene Schweitzer, Joelle Leandre…….working currently in konk pack (with Tim
Hodgkinson & Thomas Lehn), duo w/ Annette Peacock, the Josef Nadj dance
project, the Phil Minton quartet, the trio with Michel Doneda and John
Russell, the duos with John Russell, Phil minton… numerous recordings…
tours & concerts have been throughout europe, australia, canada, u.s.a.,
mexico, china and japan, and have included such remote places as the arctic.
Mia Zabelka (Violin / Voice) Austria
Sound artist, violinist and vocalist from Vienna, Mia says “I do not understand crossover as a constructed mergence of different
musical styles. Various musical genres that interest me, from classical music,
to free improvised and electronic music, punk, jazz to heavy metal are filtered
by me, through my body. From this concentrate I can then create a new
language, my very own specific way of expression.”