"Jack Oliver Cooper (born February 1980) is an English singer, composer and guitarist. Currently a member of Modern Nature, Cooper was previously a member of The Beep Seals, Mazes and Ultimate Painting.

Cooper was born in Blackpool, and re-located to Manchester in the early 2000s. In 2003, he signed to Twisted Nerve Records and released the song Hope I Don't Cry on a 7" single with 2 other artists which was issued as part of the label's mail order single subscription service. I

However, instead of continuing to pursue a solo career Cooper served as part of Noir's backing band along with former Alfie guitarist Ian Smith on drums. The musicians dubbed themselves The Beep Seals and helped Noir record and tour his debut album Tower of Love, which was released in December 2005. Following tour commitments, the band parted ways with Jim Noir and began working on their own material with Cooper and Smith co-fronting. Through 2007, the band released 2 singles in the form of Tell Your Friends and Stars. In 2018, the band released their debut album Things That Roar, which was produced by Teenage Fanclub frontman Norman Blake.

In 2009, Cooper formed Mazes. Initially conceived as a solo project following the split of the Beep Seals, after some early lineup changes the band lineup was completed by bassist Neil Robinson and drummer Conan Roberts. The band went on to release 3 albums proper; A Thousand Heys in 2011, Ores & Minerals in 2013 and Wooden Aquarium in 2014.

Following the quiet disbandment of Mazes in 2014, Cooper moved on to work with former Veronica Falls member James Hoare and formed Ultimate Painting. The band signed to US record label Trouble in Mind and released 3 albums in quick succession; Ultimate Painting in 2014, Green Lanes in 2015 and Dusk in 2016. Commenting on the productivity of the band, Cooper commented that "after we made the first record I knew that this is something we'd be doing for a while but to do three records in three years does feel like an achievement. Being completely honest, it's not always easy. We're two very different people and we disagree about even the tiniest thing". In August 2017, Cooper released his debut solo album Sandgrown via Trouble in Mind, influenced by his childhood in Blackpool.

In January 2018, Ultimate Painting announced that their fourth album Up was set for release in the following April via Bella Union and shared lead-single Not Gonna Burn Myself Anymore. A UK tour to coincide with the release was announced and put on sale. On 12 February 2018, Jack Cooper announced that the band were splitting up, adding that "the partnership at the core of this band has always been a very fragile thing, but due to an irreconcilable breakdown we will no longer be working with each other". The previously announced album release was cancelled at Cooper's express request and the UK tour to support it was also cancelled.

In February 2019, Cooper unveiled his new band Modern Nature, announcing their debut EP Nature which was released in March via Bella Union. Commenting on the lineup of the band, Cooper revealed that "the band is so new, it's hard to say who's in and who isn't. At the moment it's myself and Will Young (Beak>), with Aaron Neveu on drums (Woods/Herbcraft), Rupert Gillett on cello and then Jeff Tobias on saxophone". Young also previously played live with Ultimate Painting, and Tobias is a member of US band Sunwatchers

During the early months of the 2020 pandemic, Cooper and Modern Nature's collaborators launched a sprawling improvisation project called Cycles which was followed by a mini-album Annual which built on the jazz influenced direction explored on a series of self released improvisation cassettes featuring Cooper and collaborator Jeff Tobias.

In the summer of 2021, Cooper and collaborator Jeff Tobias released an album of Cooper's composed music called 'Tributaries' on the American jazz label Astral Spirits. The album received plaudits, particularly Downbeat magazine who described it as "conversational, neither overly composed nor overly improvisational. The systems within feel as if they could go on forever in an infinite loop. Tributaries uses space and pacing to good effect throughout. Tobias plays the perfect foil to Cooper's guitar playing, highlighting the compositions without overpowering Cooper's guitar. Cooper describes the aim as "melodic collectivism" and Tributaries gets there."

In 2021, Modern Nature released an ambitious project called 'Island Of Noise' which incorporated a second LP called 'Island Of Silence' and a book with contributors such as Merlin Sheldrake and Booker nominated poet Robin Robertson. The album was met with universal acclaim."

"Cellist Anton Lukoszevieze (born 1965 in the UK) is one of the most diverse performers of his generation and is notable for his performances of avant-garde, experimental and improvised music. Anton has given many performances at numerous international festivals throughout Europe and the USA (Maerzmusik, Donaueschingen, Wien Modern, GAS, Transart, Ultima, etc.etc.). He has also made frequent programmes and broadcasts for BBC Radio 3, Danish Radio, SR2, Sweden, Deutschland Rundfunk, WDR, Germany and ORT, Austria. Deutschlandfunk, Berlin produced a radio portrait of him in September, 2003. Anton has also performed concerti with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra at the 2001 Aldeburgh festival and the Netherlands Radio Symphony Orchestra. He has collaborated with many composers and performers including David Behrman, Alvin Lucier, Amnon Wolman, Pierre Strauch, Rytis Mazulis, Karlheinz Essl, Helmut Oehring, Christopher Fox, Philip Corner, Alvin Curran, Phill Niblock and Laurence Crane, He is unique in the UK through his use of the curved bow (BACH-Bogen), which he is using to develop new repertoire for the cello. From 2005-7 he was New Music Fellow at Kings College, Cambridge and Kettles Yard Gallery. Anton is the subject of four films (FoxFire Eins) by the renowned artist-filmmaker Jayne Parker. A new film Trilogy with compositions by Sylvano Bussotti, George Aperghis and Laurence Crane premieres at The London Film Festival, October 2008. In November will premiere a new hour long work by Christopher Fox for cello and the vocal ensemble Exaudi commissioned by the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival and will also present new solo works for cello and live electronics. Anton is also active as an artist, his work has been shown in Holland (Lux Nijmegen), CAC, Vilnius, Duisburg (EarPort), Austria, (Sammlung Essl), Wien Modern, The Slade School of Art, Kettles Yard Gallery, Cambridge Film Festival and Rational Rec. London. His work has been published in Musiktexte, Cologne, design Magazine and the book SoundVisions (Pfau-Verlag, Saarbrucken, 2005). Anton Lukoszevieze is founder and director of the ensemble Apartment House, a member of the radical noise group Zeitkratzer and recently made his contemporary dance debut with the Vincent Dance Company in Broken Chords, Dusseldorf."

"Alexander Hawkins is a composer, pianist, organist, and bandleader who is 'unlike anything else in modern creative music' (Ni Kantu) and whose recent work has reached a 'dazzling new apex' (Downbeat). A largely self-taught improviser, he works in a vast array of creative contexts. His own highly distinctive soundworld is forged through the search to reconcile both his love of free improvisation and profound fascination with composition and structure. In 2012, he was chosen as a member of the first edition of the London Symphony Orchestra's 'Soundhub' scheme for young composers. He also received a major BBC commission in late 2012 for a fifty minute composition: One Tree Found was first performed and broadcast in March 2013, and was subsequently performed and broadcast for the WDR in Cologne (2014). He has also twice been commissioned by the London Jazz Festival (once as composer, once as an arranger), and by the Cheltenham Jazz Festival (2016).

An in-demand sideman, Hawkins continues to be heard live and on record with vast array of contemporary leaders of all generations, including the likes of Evan Parker, John Surman, Joe McPhee, Mulatu Astatke, Wadada Leo Smith, Anthony Braxton, Marshall Allen, Rob Mazurek, Taylor Ho Bynum, and Harris Eisenstadt, amongst many others. He has also been noted in recent years for his performances in the bands of legendary South African drummer, Louis Moholo-Moholo. Concert appearances have taken him to club, concert and festival stages worldwide."

"Born in Canada, clarinetist Heather Roche trained in England, lived in Germany for 7 years and now lives in London.

She has performed at some of the major European festivals, including musikFest (Berlin), BachFest (Leipzig), Musica Nova (Helsinki), Acht Brücken (Cologne), the International Computer Music Conference (Huddersfield, Ljubljana), the Dias de Música Electroacústica (Seia, Portugal) and the Agora Festival (Ircam, Paris). She has also performed solo programmes at the Zagreb Music Biennale, the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, the New York Electroacoustic Symposium, at CIRMMT (Montreal), Unerhörte Musik (Berlin), Eavesdropping (London), and with the Birmingham Electroacoustic Sound Theatre (BEAST).

She has performed with ensembles and orchestras including Musik Fabrik (Cologne), the WDR Orchestra (Cologne), mimitabu (Gothenburg), the London Symphony Orchestra (London), ensemble Garage (Cologne), ensemble interface (Berlin), the Riot Ensemble (London), the Alisios Camerata (Zagreb), and ensemble proton (Bern). She also plays across the UK in a trio with Carla Rees (flutes) and Xenia Pestova (piano) and in 2015 formed an duo with the accordionist Eva Zöllner, with whom she has played across Germany, the UK and in Portugal. She is a founding member of hand werk, a 6-person chamber music ensemble based in Cologne, and worked with the group from 2010-2017.

She has solo CDs out on the HCR/NMC and Métier labels. Please see the Discography for further details.

In 2014 she was awarded a DIVA (Danish International Visiting Artists Fellowship), and lived in Copenhagen for two months.

Since 2016 she has acted as the Reviews Editor for TEMPO, a quarterly journal for contemporary music published by Cambridge University Press.

Her website is host to one of the most widely read new music blogs on the Internet. In 2017 it had 75,000 hits from around the world. She successfully crowdfunded in 2014 in order to host her first composition competition. Six young composers were chosen out of 270 applicants to write new pieces, which were premiered in 2016.

She is a fervent advocate of collaboration, and her PhD research at the University of Huddersfield (under the supervision of Dr. Philip Thomas) explored the nature of dialogue within performer-composer relationships. She has given workshops in instrumental technique and/or iPad use in performance all over Europe, for example in London, Munich and Copenhagen.

Heather completed her Masters of Music (Orchestral Training) in 2006 at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London, studying under Joy Farrall and Laurent Ben Slimane, in addition to conducting with Sian Edwards. Following her degree she completed residencies with the International Ensemble Modern Academy, at IMPULS in Graz and with ensemble recherche in Freiburg, the Darmstadt Summer Courses 2008 and 2010 and the International Ensemble Modern Academy in Innsbruck, Austria. She has performed in masterclasses with Michael Collins, Ernesto Molinari and Shizuyo Oka, to name a few. She completed her BMus in 2005 at the University of Victoria, Canada, studying under Patricia Kostek."