Monday 11 April 2022, 8pm
It’s almost four years since their last opus — two years since the most-recent run of live shows! Now, Bitchin Bajas return from whatever kind of rare ether they occupy when they’re at home, bearing the riches of the whole cosmos in their hands. And strictly OG as well—on cassette only!
Switched On Ra is the outcome of a typical Bajas exercise: pouring some out for the pioneers that came before (as they’ve done with Bitchitronics and their participation in the annual Chicago performance of “In C” over the years). It’s a nice way to get a flow—they play a little of themselves, then some for the pioneers, then a little more for the band. Before long, they’re playing with the inspirations twined, as they can only come from within.
For Switched On Ra, this meant a deep delve into the song-book of one of their soul-predeces- sors, Sun Ra, whose music is literally written in the Bajas DNA. Digging into this music sounded wild on paper: the drone synth group taking on the Arkestra harmonies and Ra’s loose grooves? The trick was to get that sense of rhythm to translate across the spectrum from Ra to Bajas, in a way that worked for them both.
In 2017 Jeremiah Chiu & Marta Sofia Honer traveled together to the Åland Islands (an archipelago that is host to around 6,500 islands) in the Baltic Sea between Sweden and Finland. They headed to the islands with the intention of helping two friends (mother/daughter duo Jannika/Sage Reed) barn raise a small inn named Hotel Svala in Kumlinge (a municipality consisting of a small group of islands and a population of about 320). The idea was that, once completed, Svala would host artist residencies and workshop programs, creating a direct link between the islands and the USA.
The concept of recording music there came about as Honer & Chiu learned more and more about the islands. They were taken by the serene and strange quality of the place. The sun doesn’t set in the summer (and barely rises in the winter). The network of miniature islands is traversed by ferry which, according to Chiu, “casts a surreal horizontal movement through space and time, with islands shifting into and out of periphery, totally still and calm, yet always in motion.”
In 2019 they were awarded a grant from the Department of Culture to return and perform a concert at the Kumlinge Kyrka, a 14th century medieval church adorned with incredible frescos. The concert was recorded and became source material – along with improvisations on viola and electronics, pipe organ, pump organ, piano, synthesizers, field recordings and voice memos, all captured across both their trips at various locations on the archipelago – from which they meticulously crafted a post-script in the form of Recordings from the Åland Islands.
John Biddulph is a composer, performer, and sound artist working across electro-acoustic music, modular synthesis, and acoustic instrumentation. His practice explores timbre, resonance, microtonality, and deep listening through works that combine electronics with bass clarinet, saxophone, field recordings, voice, and found sound. Drawing on traditions of experimental music, free improvisation, and sonic art, his performances move between fragile near-silence and dense electronic textures, often unfolding through slow transformation and close attention to sonic detail.
His compositions and live works have been presented in festivals, galleries, theatres, and experimental music contexts across the UK and internationally, including projects connected to the Darwin Festival, Exile Festival, and performances linked to electro-acoustic and site-responsive practice. Recent works include Hibakusha (performed at the 2025 World Expo in Osaka), Threnody for Tehran, The Sonic Microscope, and Voyage of the Beagle, all of which foreground listening as both a musical and perceptual act.
Alongside his compositional work, Biddulph is an active live performer, creating immersive solo performances using modular synthesiser systems, live processing, and acoustic instruments. His work frequently engages with architecture, memory, environmental sound, and the unstable behaviour of electronic systems.
In 2026/27 he was awarded a prestigious Britten Pears Arts Award in recognition of his developing project The Sonic Microscope, an exploration of microscopic sonic change, timbral perception, and immersive listening practices.
Website – https://www.handmadesound.co.uk
Bandcamp – https://handmadesound.bandcamp.com
Instagram - @handmadesound
Performance
For A Tribute to Éliane Radigue at Cafe OTO, John will present a performance informed by Radigue’s L'Île re-sonante with its patient approach to duration, harmonic drift, and the physical presence of sound, using modular synthesis and other electronics to recreate and inhabit slowly evolving sonic states inspired by this specific electronic work.
