Mon 16 November 2020

Stream time / 6:00pm

EFG London Jazz Festival is very proud to present its inaugural showcase of artists from Serious’ prestigious Take Five talent development programme – a scheme that supports emerging jazz and improvising musicians through mentorship, residencies, and collaborations. Past participants include Seb Rochford, Shabaka Hutchings, Yazz Ahmed, and Nubya Garcia. The inaugural Take Five presents features performances by 10 artists from the last two years of Take Five, who Serious have commissioned to create a bespoke video of a performance of some of their newest material which will be broadcast throughout the festival.

Touching on free improvisation, chamber music, minimalism and jazz, 'Liber Musika' is an ever-growing body of compositions from North East bass player and improviser John Pope. Inspired by the work of AACM radicals like Anthony Braxton, Roscoe Mitchell and Wadada Leo Smith, these pieces are an exercise in space and form, rhythm and melody, texture and abstraction. Designed to fit any lineup and with the musicians given authority to navigate the music as they wish, John's compositions set a lyrical tone to be inhabited and deconstructed in performance by some of the most adventurous improvisers around.

'Liber Musika' is a bracing experiment in sound poetry from one of the UK's most curious musical creatives. Performing in the beautiful setting of Newcastle-upon-Tynes' Literary and Philosophical Society Library, John has assembled a drummerless quartet of Northern improvisers to present this latest working of 'Liber Musika' for EFG London Jazz Festival.

John Pope: Double bass, Compositions

Adam Fairhall: Accordion, Harmonium

Faye MacCalman: Clarinet, Tenor Saxophone

Anton Hunter: Electric Guitar

Take Five Presents: John Pope's Liber Musika

Artist Links