The latest Tor Fm has a 40 minute interview with Christina Carter with a little interject from Tom towards the end. Also a fair chunk of their Charalambides show we hosted at The Golden Lion in Todmorden. Listen in!
The Golden Lion had a feature on Vice Magazine recently.. the video they made is such a sweet documentary and you even get to see a bit of Tor Beers at one point. Check eet out here.
Hello! I’ve put up a recording from a solo guitar gig I played last month in Huddersfield onto my Bandcamp page.
Have a listen x
http://www.in-situ.org.uk/material-culture-unearthed/
Throughout November I’ll be performing on trombone for a new mobile micro opera written by Nastassja Simensky and Rebecca Lee. All the shows will be around Pendle Hill, Lancashire, commissioned by In-Situ. Can’t wait! Nastassja is making me a costume for it and everything.
Sat 17 November: The Garage, Northlight, Brierfield 7-9pm
Sun 18 November: Clarion House, Roughlee (matinee) 3-5pm
Sat 24 November: Meeting Room, Clitheroe Library 7-9pm
Sun 25 November: Unity Wellbeing Centre, Nelson (matinee) 3-5pm
BIG THANK YOU !! thank you. To Mariette Groot at The Worm in Rotterdam for hosting the Iron Maidens project. Iron Maidens is a workshop where women are invited to compose music together on guitars. This time we went with electric guitars although a fine bass player and a homemade slide synth player also took part. Wild times. I was really impressed by everyone’s open minded approach and the show we put together couldn’t have gone better. Sadly there is no recording but I have pictures…
If anyone reading this would be interested in hosting another Iron Maidens session do get in touch with your ideas sofiesea@gmail.com
I wanted to write a post about my trombone improvisation project that I’ve been running over the past year because I’m fairly confident it’s over now. Good to have a record of these things… so…
It started during my Curfew Tower residency in Cushendall, Northern Ireland in a phone box outside, specifically. I posted the phone number of the box online and invited people to call me. When they rang I asked them a couple of questions that gave me parameters to improvise a trombone solo on. Most of the recordings of this can be heard on my album that came out last year on Crow Vs Crow –
I performed this process of question asking equalling improvisation at a party in the kitchen of the Curfew Tower also –
Later that week after the residency had ended I was invited to perform at a house party in Athlone in Ireland. Dial a bone was performed in front of a live audience mainly of people I didn’t know. Nice thing about boning is you make friends easily.
A couple of months later, back in the UK, I was asked to perform my new act at a small art studio in Sheffield. This one was a bit weird because I hooked up my mobile to a PA and got friends to call in, all prearranged. I’ve definitely got good friends who obliged but they all use different methods of contact so phone calls got interrupted by Whats App calls and things like this. A few lessons learnt there.
Then Ryoko Akama (legit sound artist) invited me to perform Dial a Bone at her AME event in Huddersfield. How could I refuse? I decided to approach the format in a new way and asked people to contact me on Skype so that their images would be on stage with me. Musically it went really well! Although an audience member mentioned that they felt ignored so again…lessons learnt. Isn’t art a fine thing.
Then the last performance took place back at The Curfew Tower, although, I was in North London at the time. They had a party in Northern Ireland and the party organisers put my mobile number into the original phone box so that people could call me. I was teaching teenage composers at the time and luckily one was a bass trombone player so we performed as a duo. It felt good to past on the trade to young James who was really into it.
So there you go. It went back full circle in way. It’s been an interesting project that has made me consider improvisation in other ways. Really into this concept of parameters and it has lead onto another new trombone stunt I’ve got now – Trombone Aerobics.
Thanks to the Curfew Tower, especially Bill Drummond for texting my friend to say he was into it. Debbie Sharp and Rosanne Robertson – you are both amazing.
Cheers.
The lovely people at The Worm in Rotterdam have invited me over to run an Iron Maidens session there. I’m super excited to be running the workshop with electric guitars this time so I reckon things are going to get quite wild… Info below. If you want to get involved visit this link – https://worm.org/
While I’m in The Netherlands I’ll be performing with Delphine Dora in both Rotterdam and Amsterdam. Ignatz is playing the Amsterdam show as well and I’m a BIG FAN so smiley face from me.
12th October – Iron Maidens session, 12 – 5pm followed by evening concert. Also performing with Delphine Dora. The Worm, Rotterdam
13th October – Duo with Delphine Dora. OCCII, Amsterdam https://occii.org/
Iron Maidens is a one-day workshop where participants will explore electric guitar playing and group composition via a series of guitar playing techniques lead by Sophie Cooper. The workshop will have a strong emphasis on how to listen and respond to other players in the group while developing individual approaches to the guitar. By the end of the workshop the group will have created a new composition that will be performed, live, at an evening concert on the same day.
Iron Maidens is open to women and non-binary people who have any guitar playing ability from beginners to experts. Participants are expected to bring their own electric guitar and amp (any size).
Sophie Cooper is a musician based in West Yorkshire, UK. Sophie has been playing guitar for over 20 years, performs regularly and teaches music professionally across West Yorkshire. Please get in touch with Sophie if you have any questions about the workshop via email – sofiesea@gmail.com
DJ Car Tape all cassette special this month! Cleaned out the glovebox, cool tunes for the road and in your house as well.
