"Martin Archer was born in Sheffield, England, in 1957. He started playing saxophone at age 15 and first got active on the Sheffield improvisational scene in 1973. In the early '80s, he recorded an LP with Bass Tone Trap, his first group. In 1983 he formed the saxophone quartet Hornweb, which, in ten years of existence, released three albums. It is during that time that Archer released his first solo album, Wild Pathway Favourites (1988) and founded the Discus label on which he since releases all his music.

In 1993, he disbanded Hornweb and turned to synthesizers and sequencers while shifting his activities from stage to studio. He developed a compositional approach in which he records improvisers soloing, then manipulates this raw material, combining it with electronics and structuring it into a whole new piece. This technique is illustrated on Wild Pathway Favourites, Ghost Lily Cascade (1996), and Pure Water Construction (with bassist Simon H. Fell, released in 1999). Later works such as Winter Pilgrim Arriving (2000) moved toward more constructed and less abstract pieces, even making room for melodies and rhythm tracks at times.

Apart from his solo work, Archer is also involved in Ask, a duo with guitarist John Jasnoch, and Transient v Resident, an ambient electronics project with Chris Bywater."-All Music, François Couture

"Martin Archer is a composer / improviser who is equally at home on stage or in the studio. His own distinctive saxophone playing is rooted in AACM jazz. Through his use of keyboards and electronics, and as a studio producer, he extends this interest into extended song form and leftfield rock music. He is also co-director of the uncategorisably avant choir Juxtavoices.

His principle music work is the Discus Music label, the imprint for his various releases, notably by the groups described below.

His current jazz based projects include Engine Room Favourites (current a 4 drummer, 14 piece big band), Story Tellers (6 piece group including shaman instruments alongside the conventional instruments), plus various ad hoc smaller groups. All of these are strongly aligned with AACM tradition and teaching.

Archer has a long running duo with veteran vocalist Julie Tippetts. Each of their highly acclaimed CD releases deliberately explores song from a different perspective - the duo aims to be truly progressive, and takes in elements from jazz, rock, soul and pure abstraction.

Archer's main live performance vehicle is the trio Inclusion Principle with Herve Perez and Peter Fairclough. The group operates in a space between electronics, nu-jazz, contemporary electroacoustic music and free improvisation. In performance you will hear pure jazz skill, electronic beats and areas of texture and abstraction all seamlessly woven into a fascinating and constantly shifting tapestry of sound.

The sprawling Orchestra Of The Upper Atmosphere was formed by Archer as an improvising rock group with shades of Terry Riley, Magma, Alice Coltrane and Sun Ra, very much in the progressive / krautrock tradition, and noted for its large scale string, horn and vocal arrangements.

Also in rock music, Archer is a member of the USA based heavier than plutonium prog / sludge / zeuhl group Combat Astronomy under the direction of Jamie Huggett.

Surprising, delighting and occasionally alarming audiences for a number of years now, Juxtavoices is a 30 piece choir for mainly untrained voices co directed by Archer with Alan Halsey which has racked up dozens of performances and issued three CDs.

This eclectic combination of sources and highly individual applications makes Archer a unique inhabitant of the school of English maverick composer / improvisers. "-Discus

"On the free scene since 1980, as an improvising big band leader to solo performer, Mick is known for his energy and originality: his playing covers the full emotional gamut from heartbreaking to mischievous, and from abstracts to compelling swing.

His improvising big band Feet Packets was unique in the UK and influential in the late 1980s. In the 1990s he led many small groups including the powerful free jazz trio Something Else with Paul Hession and Simon Fell, which released two acclaimed CDs. Since the millennium, Beck's ground-breaking work with the mysterious and humorous bassoon, supplemented by his use of other wind instruments add many new sounds and moods. In 2005, Beck formed another big band, Gated Community, a 15-piece group, which revisited the boundaries between total musical freedom and novel compositions. Some videos remain of the band's performances, which included two engagements with Damo Suzuki as guest artist.

Beck's technical innovations and musical ideas are often a source of inspiration to his collaborators on stage, and hehe works with many of free music's best-known exponents covering a wide age range. He is based in Sheffield , plays regularly in London and elsewhere in the UK and from time to time in Spain, Germany, Austria, France, Canada and Australia .

He has worked with many great musicians such ass saxists J.D. Parran to Alan Wilkinson, guitarists Derek Bailey to Hugh Metcalfe, percussionists Tony Buck to Steve Noble and Paul Hession, bassists Marcio Mattos to Simon Fell, pianists Chris Burn to Stephen Grew and Pat Thomas.

In the 1990s through to 2004, he was one of the lead organisers of Sheffield 's Other Music, a bastion of the UK 's free music scene for 22 years from 1982 to 2004.

He has worked with many great musicians such ass saxists J.D. Parran to Alan Wilkinson, guitarists Derek Bailey to Hugh Metcalfe, percussionists Tony Buck to Steve Noble and Paul Hession, bassists Marcio Mattos to Simon Fell, pianists Chris Burn to Stephen Grew and Pat Thomas.

In the 1990s through to 2004, he was one of the lead organisers of Sheffield 's Other Music, a bastion of the UK 's free music scenefor 22 years."

"I've been earning money and having fun playing music for over twenty years, firstly as a bass guitarist, trumpet player and trombonist, and, for the last twelve years, primarily as a double bass player. I first bought a bass guitar on my eighteenth birthday, and started gigging with it shortly afterwards, in bars and cafes around Sheffield, where I lived at the time. On moving to Leeds to study in 1993, I formed my first proper band, Baby Harp Seal, playing Hardcore Punk, and, in 1994, did my first tour with them, in France, Belgium and Germany. We released our first 7 inch record shortly afterwards, and an LP in 1996. Two days after my last university exam , I left on tour with the band Headache, with whom I toured extensively in Europe for the next three years; we were on tour for an average of seven months out of each year. We released an album in 1997, and continued until 1999, when the band split up. I returned to Leeds, working on several different projects, including Snail Racing, a bass guitar trio with added drums, and touring with the band Almanac.

In 2001 I moved to London, and found work with the "nu-jazz" electronic act Hefner, with whom I toured several times, as well as recording a session for Gilles Peterson's Worldwide, and playing on his stage at the North Sea Jazz festival. Lee Jones, who ran the band Hefner, also asked me to play on an album he was producing by an act called Abraham, and I subsequently played live with them too, as well as recording a session for Jonathon Ross' show on BBC Radio 2. It was during this time that I bought my first double bass, and embarked on the lifetime's work of learning how to play it. Returning to Leeds in 2003, I started to concentrate more on the jazz and improvised music side of my practice, and around this time started playing in the band 7 hertz, an improvising ensemble who used their 'classical' instrumentation - violins, bassoon, clarinets and horn - to explore chamber ensemble playing in an improvisational context. In 2008, having slimmed down to a quartet, we released an album on the label Birdwar called 'Tender, Almost Vulgar'. During this period I was also working in a band called McWatt, a duo with flautist and accordionist Sarah McWatt, with whom I released an album in 2006.

Other projects around this time included the jazz band If Destroyed Still True, who won a Parliamentary Jazz Promoter's Choice award, as well as Jazz Yorkshire's band of the year award in 2010. They released the album 'Seven Dials' in 2009, and undertook a Jazz Services funded tour. The improvised Music and Dance project 'Mathilde' started around this time too, an attempt to reconcile improvisation in two different media, dance and music. You can watch video of Mathilde elsewhere on this site. The project continues to this day, with a recent performance in Leeds on a bill along with Jer Reid and Solene Weinachter from Glasgow. The project blog is here. More recently, I have been working as a sideman for Mary Hampton, the superb folk singer from Brighton and Laura Cole's Metamorphic. Alongside this, I have been running my own trio Nut Club, the Bennett-Cole Orchestra, and a co-operative trio with pianist Laura Cole and drummer Peter Fairclough. I recently stopped playing trombone in Swiss Afro-punk dadaists rchestre Tout Puissant Marcel Duchamp.

I have been teaching at Sheffield Jazz Workshops for the last three years, for which I jointly won a Jazz Yorkshire award for Best Teacher. In the summer of 2012 I taught on the Sound and Music Composer's Summer School at the Purcell School in Hertfordshire, and I am building a busy individual teaching practise."

"Graham Leslie Lionel Clark (born 16 December 1959) is an English jazz violinist based in Buxton, Derbyshire.

He also plays electric guitar. A freelance violinist in most styles of jazz, rock, blues and pop, he specialises in improvisation.

He worked with Daevid Allen from 1988 to 2014:[1][2]

August 1988-October 1989: with the Invisible Opera Company of Tibet
October 1989-December 1991: with Gongmaison
February 1992-December 1992: with Magick Brothers / Gong
December 1996 - 2014: with Magick Brothers

He has also worked with Andy Sheppard, Keith Tippett, Tim Richards, Phil Lee, Paz, Brian Godding, Elbow, Lamb, Bryan Glancy, Little Sparrow, Jah Wobble, Graham Massey, Louis Gordon and Liz Fletcher."

"Laura Cole is a jazz composer/pianist who lives in Leeds but whose band (Metamorphic) is based in London. Metamorphic features, Kerry Andrew (vocals), Chris Williams (alto),John Martin (tenor/soprano), Paul Sandy (bass), Tom Greenhalgh (drums).

Metamorphic will play in Jazz in the Round at the Cockpit Theatre on Monday January 28th. They also have a gig at the Vortex on the 24th February with Frank Byng's (Slowfoot Records) quintet, Snorkel.

The group have one album out (The Rock Between, 2011, F-IRECD43 - reviewed by Chris Parker), and release their follow up (Coalescence, also on F-IRE) later this year (2013).

Laura also has a blog which discusses the issues that women face in music and holds a First Class Honours Degree in Jazz from Middlesex University."

"Steve Dinsdale plays keyboards and drums in the leading British electronic trio Radio Massacre International, who have released a plethora of albums over the last 20 years and played concerts in both Europe and America. He is also a member of Orchestra of the Upper Atmosphere and Engine Room Favourites, and has several solo albums to his name."

"Since graduating from the City of Leeds College of Music with Distinction in Drums and Percussion, Peter Fairclough has performed and/or recorded with Keith Tippett, Paul Dunmall, Ute Lemper, Huw Warren, Peter Whyman, Steve Berry, John Harle, Kenny Davern, Peter King, The Matrix Ensemble, The Bournemouth Sinfonietta, The Mike Westbrook Orchestra and The Theatre Royal Company (York).

He has 5 CDs to his own credit:

IMAGO (Jazzprint JPVP132)CD - with Keith Tippett), Wild Silk (ASC CD8 - with Keith Tippett), Permission (ASC CD18) and Shepherd Wheel (ASC CD1). The most recent release is Momentarily with Hayley Youell, Fred T Baker & Dave Bainbridge.

In 1995 he was awarded the Peter Whittingham Award and he has toured extensively abroad, appearing at many top jazz festivals.

Peter teaches Drum Kit at The Liverpool Institute of Performing Arts and Leeds College of Music."

"Johnny Hunter is a northern UK-based drummer who comes from a background of both the Avant-Garde and the more mainstream Jazz. He has performed or recorded with such esteemed musicians as Benn Clatworthy, Mick Beck, Nat Birchall, Jamil Sheriff, Jamie Taylor, Pete Fairclough, Walt Shaw, Corey Mwamba, Steve Beresford, Graham Clark, Adam Fairhall and Steve Berry to name a few. He is also heavily involved in the Reggae and Dub scene.

He is currently playing with Misha Gray's Prehistoric Jazz Quintet, Liverpool-based group playing heavy modal Jazz inspired by John Coltrane, Pharoah Sanders and the like; Nat Birchall; Engine Room Favourites, AACM inspired Free Jazz; the Blind Monk Trio, sax/bass/drums trio playing heavy rootjazz; the Dub Jazz Soundsystem, a mash-up of heavy Dub and psychedelic modal Jazz; Skamel, a Ska/Jazz/Dub ensemble inspired by the French Reggae group Raspigaous; his own "chordless" quartet set up to explore the freedom and limitations of having no chordal instrument; among several other projects. He also runs the Jazz jam night at Matt & Phred's Jazz Club."

"Since moving to Leeds in 2008 to study Jazz at Leeds College of Music, Kim Macari has been developing a reputation as a player, band leader and educator on the jazz scene across the UK.

She has played in numerous large ensembles including Tommy Smith Youth Jazz Orchestra, National Youth Jazz Orchestra of Scotland, John Warren's Voice of The North and the James Hamilton Jazz Orchestra, amongst others, and has had the chance to play alongside a number of highly respected jazz musicians including Kenny Wheeler, Mike Gibbs, Henry Lowther, Dave Liebman, Jacqui Dankworth, Phil Robson, Christine Tobin and Arild Andersen.

Her own projects perform regularly at jazz venues throughout the UK. Her two year collaboration with Leah Gough-Cooper and their sextet LOCUS resulted in two well received UK Tours which included a number of high profile festival dates and an archive of live recordings.

Kim's work as a performer and as a band leader has garnered recognition in the press and has been she been twice nominated as Young Jazz Musician of the Year and also Big Band of the Year by Jazz Yorkshire. In 2013, Kim received an Emerging Excellence Award from Musicians Benevolent Fund (now Help Musicians UK). This funded an extended stay in New York, where she studied with Ingrid Jensen and Ralph Alessi and recorded at Tedesco Studios.

Kim's current creative focus is on quartet Family Band, a chordless quartet which draws inspiration on the music of late Coltrane, Ornette Coleman and Jim Black amongst others. Family Band have been selected as one of 10 flagship ensembles in the North by Jazz North and are currently planning the release of their first full length album.

In addition to her work as a musician, Kim is also active in behind the scenes. She currently runs Apollo Jazz Network and is currently the director of the Orpheus Project, a large scale touring initiative which sees international jazz artists collaborate with UK musicians and tour throughout the North of England. Their featured artists have so far included Ingrid Jensen and Ellery Eskelin."

"George Murray began playing the piano and trombone aged 9. He played in Bodmin School Band and Cornwall Youth Orchestra and Jazz Orchestra before going on to study and Trinity College of Music in London.

George has performed and recorded in wide variety of contexts, in a number of innovative ensembles.

In contemporary music he has appeared as a guest soloist with Scottish Clarinet Quartet and performed regularly with the Glasgow based contemporary music group Symposia.

George was a member of Glasgow Improvisers Orchestra through which he has had the opportunity of working and recording with George Lewis, Maggie Nichols, Barry Guy and Evan Parker in a variety of different contexts. He has also recorded in Germany with Saxophonist John Tchicai and Joachim Irmler.

George has also been working as a Music Therapist and teacher for the last 12 years. He is passionate about music, and its benefits, people respond to music in a fantastic way. He is interested in person-centred learning and working with his pupils to help them to identify and fulfill their goals."

"Born and based in Derby, Corey Mwamba's commitment to jazz and improvised music in Britain and Ireland drives all aspects of his work, whether through composition, playing, or promoting new music. Corey predominantly plays vibraphone; he also plays dulcimer and uses audio processing software. He is recognised as a highly creative improviser and composer working across a wide range of jazz and contemporary music. Mwamba's distinctive approach and tone is instantly recognisable in any context: a potent blend of pure sound, highly melodic phrases and ethereal textures; barely whispered chords and ear-piercing robotic screams. Corey won a PRSF/Jerwood Foundation Take Five artist development award in 2007; was short-listed for the Innovation category in the BBC Jazz Awards in 2008; and was nominated for "Rising Star on Vibraphone" in the 62nd, 63rd, and 64th DownBeat Annual Critics' Polls.

Mwamba's main group is the critically acclaimed Yana with Dave Kane (bass) and Joshua Blackmore (drums). This group exemplifies a core ideal of creating an "open, living music"; listening and responding spontaneously as a unit to make music that has love, language and a groove. Their first studio release don't overthink it was hailed as "engaging and evocative" (All About Jazz) and described as "the sound of three minds working together in a utopian zone, way beyond the individual ego - and producing something quite beautiful in the process" (Jazzwise). Dave and Corey are also in an improvising sextet called The Spirit Farm, formed out of research by pianist Adam Fairhall. Mwamba and Fairhall also form a trio with drummer Johnny Hunter called Backyard Chassis.

He is a member of the Anglo-French quartet Sonsale with bassist Andy Champion, drummer Sylvain Darrifourcq and cellist Valentin Ceccaldi. Corey also works with Andy in an improvising trio with saxophonist Ntshuks Bonga. He plays in duos with saxophonist Rachel Musson; pianist Robert Mitchell; percussionists Martin Pyne and Walt Shaw; and the multi-instrumentalist Orphy Robinson. [...]

Mwamba was granted an AHRC studentship for a Master of Research degree in Music at Keele University, for which he was awarded a distinction in 2014. Through this research, he developed new dark art, which is a notational and theoretical music system that takes early European medieval music practice as a starting point to create modern music. He is currently undertaking doctoral research in Jazz Studies at Birmingham City University on a Midlands3Cities/AHRC studentship."

"Walt Shaw is a freelance musician and artist from near Derby in the Midlands. He has been involved in a host of arts projects for the last 28 years. Prior to becoming a freelance musician and artist he was, for 14 years, Head of Biology in a large Comprehensive near Burton-on-Trent. This was after teaching in Lincoln and northern Nigeria (VSO). His projects have ranged from exhibitions of paintings and sculpture, both solo and group, to installations, to cross-disciplinary collaborations with dancers and physical performers. In these latter projects his experimental percussion and low-tech electronics have always played a significant role.

In 1989, Walt, along with the artist Kevin Burnley, co-founded the artist group BET4. They exhibited widely in the Midlands and in Germany and Paris. By 1993, the group widened in scope, becoming increasingly involved with not just exhibitions but installations, live art and cross-disciplinary projects. These usually integrated elements of contemporary dance, live sound and physical performance along with a strong visual aesthetic. This gave Walt opportunities for experimenting with percussion in unusual contexts as well as the creativity of that visual aesthetic. Performances took place throughout England as well as Scotland, Paris and Germany. The work of BET4 had a profound influence on all the subsequent solo and collaborative projects Walt has been involved with.

Walt has enjoyed 3 major Arts Council England awards for projects. These were for 'Polarities', 'Timepoints' and 'Entropic'. Along with the artist Simon Piasecki he also carried out the A.C.E. project 'Mendel's Garden'. He has been a collaborative artist in many other A.C.E. projects. Details of all these can be seen in the 'Live Art / Cross-disciplinary' section.

Education has played a significant part in Walt's work, even after 1989.

He has carried out many workshops in both art and percussion in Primary, Secondary, F.E. and H.E. in the Midlands and the North. He has been an artist-in- residence at Melton Brooksby College in 2005 and Abbot Beyne School, Burton-on-Trent in 2009. Walt ran Creative Percussion Discussion in Derby from 2004 through to 2005, working with youngsters under the auspices of Derby Jazz. In 2006, Walt was a tutor in a Clore Duffield Foundation project working with teenagers in Belper, using an old car as a source for art, percussion and performance. 2006 saw a project alongside the inspiring musician Orphy Robinson, working in schools to make instruments from scrap objects and improvise with them. This was a Creative Partnerships project.

Walt has played with many leading improvising musicians from the U.K. and abroad and is presently playing in several bands (see 'Music') whilst still producing visual art ( see 'Visual Art'). It is fair to say he has an unease about specialism and arbitrary categorizations. His creative development over the years has always been very difficult to pigeonhole. His creative process is the same whatever the medium though, involving searching, experimentation, expression, pushing the boundaries and refining."

"UK-based Irishman Riley Stone-Lonergan started working as a professional musician in Ireland at the age of 16. After two years working with local big bands and ensembles, Riley moved to the UK to study at Leeds College of Music, the longest running jazz course in Europe. In 2011, he graduated with 1st Class Honours and was the recipient of a number of awards including the Dave Cooper Memorial Prize for Jazz Saxophone, John Scheerer Prize for Woodwind and David Hoult Prize for Outstanding Performance.

Selected as a Yamaha Jazz Scholar in 2011, Riley's quartet was featured in Jazzwise Magazine as well as performing at the 606 Club in London. Shortly after, Riley moved to London and began to work with the prestigious National Youth Jazz Orchestra. His tenure with the band included a tour of Germany, a televised performance at the Royal Albert Hall as part of the BBC Proms (including special guest Tim Garland) and the recording of the 2012 album, The Change.

In recent years, Riley has made two extended trips to New York City. Here, he studied with Seamus Blake, Chris Cheek, Rich Perry and Joel Frahm and recorded his original material at Tedesco Studios, as well as performing in Washington DC. In addition to this, Riley has worked overseas as a featured soloist at Bergamo Jazz Festival in Italy and has toured in Ireland, Germany, Poland and the UK.

His work with small groups have led to tours and performances at a number of major jazz festivals. Sextet LOCUS (Leah Gough-Cooper, Kim Macari, Sam Leak, Jay Davis, Tom Wheatley) have performed at London Jazz Festival, Manchester Jazz Festival and Edinburgh Jazz Festivals and in 2015, Riley was part of a comissioned project led by Kim Macari which featured the Rome-based Enrico Zanisi trio and shared a bill with Thelonious Monk Award winner Melissa Aldana.

Currently, Riley maintains a busy performance schedule. One of his main projects is Family Band, a chordless quartet featuring Kim Macari, Tom Riviere and Steve Hanley. Recording their debut album in 2015, the band have received airplay on BBC Radio and were selected to be one of 10 Ambassador groups on the Northern Line scheme by Jazz North. Recently, he was nominated for the Rising Star Award at the London Music Awards 2015."