Charles Hayward

Charles Hayward is an English drummer/singer/composer and was a founding member of the experimental rock groups This Heat and Camberwell Now. He also played with early European improv group Mal Dean's Amazing Band and gigged and recorded with Phil Manzanera in Quiet Sun as well as a short stint with Gong. Since the late 80's he has concentrated on solo projects and collaborations including Massacre (with Bill Laswell and Fred Frith), Monkey Puzzle Trio, Albert Newton (with Pat Thomas and John Edwards) and This Is Not This Heat which toured the UK, Europe, USA and Japan between 2016-2019 performing expanded versions of This Heat’s oeuvre to unfaltering critical acclaim. Hayward’s latest group, Abstract Concrete, formed from London players from a diversity of European underground scenes, released it’s self-titled debut album in November 2023.

Chris Sharkey

'fiercely inventive, powerfully independent' - The Guardian

Chris Sharkey is a musician from the North-East of England primarily interested in the intersection of improvisation and electronic sound.

Based in Leeds since 1999, Chris has dedicated the last 20 years to making forward-thinking new music that blurs boundaries between improvisation, production, composition and the associated genres of these often separated fields.

He is an active national and international artist, performing with Charles Hayward (This Heat) , Jack Wylie (Portico), Roller Trio, Anton Eger’s Æ, Joshua Blackmore’s SiZE, Acoustic Ladyland, trioVD, Shiver, The Geordie Approach, and as a solo artist.

Jack Wyllie

Jack Wyllie is a Multi instrumentalist and composer. He has released on labels such as Babel, Realworld, Ninja Tune and Buffalo Temple. He is member of Portico Quartet and Szun waves as well having released several EP’s of improvisations with Luke abbott and Adrian Corker. Jack plays a heavily effected saxophone using guitar pedals to add atmospheric washes of delay and reverb. Portico Quartet have always been an impossible band to pin down. Sending out echoes of jazz, electronica, ambient music and minimalism, the group have created their own singular sound. They have been nominated for the mercury music prize as well as topping several end of year lists in the likes of time out and crack magazine. Szun waves is a partly generative improvised trio with Luke abbott and Lawrence Pike, they have their second album out on leaf later this year.

Max Hallett

Max Hallett is best known for drumming in the trio The Comet Is Coming alongside bandmates Shabaka Hutchings on saxophone and keyboardist Dan Leavers, who he also has a drum and synth duo with called Soccer 96.
Soccer96 play everything completely live, with no laptops, sequencers or software of any kind. They create brutal, frenetic energy, Tron-like soundscapes and super-fresh polyrhythms. "Distilled reduction meets epic intent."

Tom Herbert

Tom Herbert is a bass player in Mercury Music Prize nominated bands The Invisible and Polar Bear, as well as vocal/double bass duo Moats & Thrones. He was also was a founding member of the British jazz-punk band Acoustic Ladyland. The Invisible have released three albums and are currently signed to Ninja Tune. Their self-titled debut album was released in 2009, produced by innovative electronic musician Matthew Herbert, it was nominated for the Mercury Music Prize and was the 'iTunes Critics Choice Album Of The Year'. Their third album 'Patience' was released in June 2016 to critical acclaim, including a five-star review in The Guardian. Tom is also currently on the teaching staff at The Royal Academy of Music.

Pete Bennie

Pete Bennie is a bass player known for Tout and the London based post jazz outfit Morviscous. Peter studied music at Goldsmiths university and has gone on to work with numerous bands. He is currently developing a solo instrumental project that will be released via Trestle Records later in the year.

Bex Burch

Bex Burch is a composer, percussionist, instrument maker and improviser who emphasises space, repetition and aspects of chaos. These themes characterise an ongoing approach she describes as “messy minimalism”.

Burch’s critically acclaimed 2023 debut solo album, 'There is only love and fear' was released via Chicago avant-garde label International Anthem and named The Guardian's Contemporary Album of the Month. She was nominated for the Deutscher Jazzpreis 2025, and has previously released music as part of Boing! with Leafcutter John, the Strut-released cosmic, boundary pushing quintet, Flock, critically acclaimed Vula Viel and with KORG Berlin. She set up her own DIY label, runs the community music event, Kantine Musik, and has collaborated with a diverse range of artists such as Peter Zummo, Kuljit Bhamra, Evelyn Glennie, Tamar Osborn, Che Chen and Dudù Kouate.

Bex was invited to Ghana for an 18-month apprenticeship from 2008 in instrument-making with master gyil player Thomas Sekgura, a strong early influence and experience that gave her a deep-seated respect for the powerful Dagaare music as well as the confidence to pursue a path that reflected her own voice and the myriad strands and tastes of her creativity. A restless, questing spirit has informed her career since, from the open-hearted collaborations of her constantly shapeshifting musical releases to the creation of a new xylophone, a non-traditional instrument she handmade under Jamie Linwood’s mentorship.

Her new piece, ‘as yet untitled’, extends the palette of composition, found sounds and improvisatory messy minimalism, and forms part of a durational work Burch will pursue for the next 42 years. Beyond writing and performing music and running her DIY record label, Bex mixes and produces records, curates radio shows and runs ‘Kantine Musik’, a regular live music happening born of the quiet “tradition” of making music that brings people together, for each other. All of Bex’s work embraces uncertainty, co-creation and the potential for music to connect in deep, unexpected and intuitive ways.