Monday 11 January 2027, 7.30pm
The London Improvisers Orchestra is proud to present a two-night residency featuring a star-studded line-up of many of London’s most revered improvisers, alongside up-and-coming stars of the future.
Formed in the summer of 1998, the London Improvisers Orchestra is dedicated to large ensemble conducted improvisation, or ‘Conduction’, and free improvisation.
The orchestra was formed from the ashes of the 1997 touring group of American improviser Butch Morris, the pioneering inventor of Conduction. Since its birth, the group has had hundreds of members pass through its ranks, including Evan Parker, Pat Thomas, Byron Wallen, John Edwards, Lol Coxhil, Caroline Kraabel, and Mark Sanders.
Full lineup to be announced soon.
Steve Beresford has been a central figure in the British and international spontaneous music scenes for over fifty years, freely improvising on piano, objects, electronics and other things with people like Derek Bailey, Evan Parker, Han Bennink and John Zorn. Long-standing groups have included Alterations (with David Toop, Terry Day and Peter Cusack), The Melody Four (with Lol Coxhill and Tony Coe, both RIP) and London Improvisers Orchestra.
He has written songs, composed for large and small ensembles, and scored short films, feature films, TV shows and commercials. He was part of the editorial teams of ‘Musics’ and ‘Collusion’ magazines, writes about music in various contexts, and was a senior lecturer in music at the University of Westminster.
Steve has worked with Christian Marclay on various Marclay mixed media pieces. He has also worked with The Slits, Najma Akhtar, Stewart Lee, Ivor Cutler, Prince Far-I, Alan Hacker, Tania Chen, Louis Moholo-Moholo, Faradena Afifi, Blanca Regina, Ray Davies, Mandhira De Saram, The Flying Lizards, Zeena Parkins, The Portsmouth Sinfonia, Ilan Volkov, Rachel Musson, Vic Reeves, Lore Lixenberg, Valentina Magaletti and many others.
Beresford has an extensive discography - around 500 releases - as performer, arranger, free-improviser, composer, conductor and producer. He was awarded a Paul Hamlyn award for composers in 2012.
In 2021, Bloomsbury published a book by Andy Hamilton: ‘Pianos, Toys, Music and Noise: Conversations with Steve Beresford’.
In 2022, Siglio published the book ‘Call and Response’, which partnered photographs by Christian Marclay with notated improvisations by Beresford.
Julian Woods is an eclectic musician and composer based in London. He performs on guitars (regular or microtonal), bass guitars (fretted or fretless), and double bass.
In 2024, Julian graduated with a distinction from the Jazz Performance Master’s at the Guildhall School of Music. Previously, he studied an undergraduate degree in Chemistry at the University of Oxford. He also holds a Diploma from the American Festival of Microtonal Music’s ‘Microtonal University’.
Julian is involved in a variety of projects, including directing the London Improvisers Orchestra, which was described as "one of the essential institutions of improvised music" by New York City Jazz Record; leading his microtonal jazz group Buchteln Trio with Philipp Gerschlauer and Diego Pinera; and collaborating with the Guildhall New Music Society. He has recently performed at the Vortex Jazz Club, Cafe OTO, EFG London Jazz Festival, Wigmore Hall, Porgy & Bess (Vienna), and Untwelving (Munich).
Julian’s varied work as a sideman has included stints playing guitar with Cameroonian singer Coco Mbassi and in Sam Eastmond’s Composers Workshop Big Band, double bass with Egyptian singer Amena, and bass guitar in hardcore band Human Interference Task Force.
The musicians Julian has worked with include Maggie Nicols, Steve Beresford, Alex Paxton, Maddie Ashman, Adam Bohman, Charlotte Keeffe, Mahan Mirarab, Tom Challenger, Phil Minton, Oren Marshall, Li-chin Li, John Butcher, Corrie Dick, Fergus Quill, Caius Williams, and Georg Vogel.
Ashley Wales is a British composer and record producer, one half of Spring Heel Jack with John Coxon and an integral part of Bruise with Tony Bevan. He put on and hosted the monthly ‘back in your town’ concerts at the Red Rose in North London which saw the likes of John Tchicai, Other Dimensions in Music, Matthew Shipp, Han Bennink and many others playing with local improvising musicians. Ashley uses a wide range of sources to make music with including live sampling, electronics and acoustic instruments .
