An evening of non-stop rotating ensembles, solo performances and small groups to celebrate MIKE COOPER @ 70 rpm featuring... David Toop, Steve Beresford, Roger Turner, Ted Milton, Veryan Weston, Roberto Bellatalla, Fabrizio Spera, Luca Tilli, Hannah Marshall, Sylvia Hallett, Alison Blunt, Geoff Hawkins, Mike Adcock, Richard Sanderson, Chris Hladowski, Family Elan, Tim Hill, Clive Bell, Scanner, Dave Tucker... and many more.

MIKE COOPER

For the past 40 years Mike Cooper has been an international musical explorer, performing and recording, solo and in a number of inspired groupings and a variety of genres. Initially a folk-blues guitarist and singer songwriter his work has diversified to include improvised and electronic music, live music for silent films, radio art and sound installations. He is also a music journalist, writing features for magazines, particularly on Pacific music and musicians, a visual artist, film and video maker, collector of Hawaiian shirts and appears on more than 60 records to date.



"Cooper stands out as the man who truly made something of his own out of Country-Blues..." (The Guardian)

"...a quantum leap into Folk-Jazz..." (Trout Steel - Folk Roots)

"...featured in the pioneering New Musical Express Book Of Rock in the mid-70's...Mike Cooper may never have matched the commercial success of some of his contemporaries, but he can boast an impressive body of work that continues to grow." (David Wells - Paper and Smoke liner notes)

In the late 1970's he began to develop a parallel career and establish himself on the avant-garde and free-improvised music scene, working initially with members of the London Musicians Collective, such as Eddie Prevost, Keith Rowe, David Toop, Steve Beresford, Max Eastley, Paul Burwell, dancer Jo-Anna Pyne. and vocalist Viv Corringham. With saxophonist Lol Coxhill and drummer Roger Turner, they formed The Recedents, a free improvising trio now in its third decade.

In 1999 he started HIPSHOT to produce limited edition cdRs from his studio The Steelworks in Rome where he currently lives. The first release Kiribati was chosen as one of the best 'Outer Limits' cds of the year by the prestigious UK magazine The WIRE and Rayon Hula won an honorary mention at the 2005 Prix Ars Electronica for Digital Music.

"Cooper here explores the drone in a loose tribute to fellow Rome resident, the late Giacinto Scelsi. Armed with his trusty National Resophonic and a small electric fan, plus some very discreet signal processing here and there, Cooper's work is, as usual, utterly spellbinding. The metallic resonance of his instrument heightens the harmonic overtones, producing gleaming textures that recall massed hurdy-gurdies one moment and indian tamburas the next. Cooper was forging connections between folk and experimental musics long before America got New or Wierd delving particularly deep into Hawaiian slide guitar styles. Giacinto is one of his more aesthetically demanding documents, not offering the consolation of the beautiful songs that broke up the rigorous improv of his 2004 album Reluctant Swimmer/Virtual Surfer, but still sounding like the work of one man, one guitar and endless supplies of imagination and heart." (Keith Moline - The Wire on GIACINTO - Hipshot 017)