Rowland Sutherland / Ansuman Biswas / Pat Thomas / Guillaume Viltard

Event information

Rowland’s quartet is a new dynamic group of highly respected musicians merging together to create something that is transcendental, colourful, expansive, otherworldly and deep. Music that is both driven and inventive with the occasional subterraneous excursions.

Evocative, worldly explorations of free improvisation, jazz and groove sounds with added inspirations from the Caribbean and India. Ethereal themes converge with hypnotic rhythms, celestial textures, raw shifting ostinatos, psychedelic dub waves, colliding counterpoints and layers of sostenuto. A rich blend of elements from this vibrant quartet that promises music-making that challenges as well as soothes the listener.

Tonight's performance will mark the quartets debut concert.

Rowland Sutherland is widely regarded as being one of the most versatile flautists in the UK. He can regularly be seen performing with some of the finest jazz bands, improvised music groups, new music ensembles, symphony orchestras, non-Western groups, pop outfits, and as a soloist, throughout Europe and further afield.
He has performed at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Centre, the North Sea Jazz Festival, Amsterdam Concertgebouw, Chatelet Les Halles and Tokyo Opera City Concert Hall. Sutherland is also active as a composer and his recent composition Enlightenment (In
the Spirit of A Love Supreme) has received a lot of praise following sold out performances of the work at James Lavelle’s Meltdown 2014 at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, where it received standing ovations.

Ansuman Biswas has worked as a composer, percussionist and creative artist in a wide range of contexts from jazz to Indian Classical music, pop songs to industrial noise. He has been commissioned by the Sonic Arts Network, the National Theatre, the Royal Ballet, the English National Opera and Guangdong Modern Dance Company in China as well as numerous other ensembles, film makers, theatre and dance companies. He has worked with the BBC, Channel Four, MTV, the Royal Opera House, the National Theatre and with Bjork, Courtney Pine, The Specials, Talvin Singh, Nitin Sawhney, Oasis and the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra.

The piano and electronics artist Pat Thomas has performed with Derek Bailey, was a member of the Tony Oxley Quartet, played in Oxley's Angular Apron along with Larry Stabbins, Manfred Schoof and Sirone and played with Lol Coxhill. He plays with Mike Cooper's Continental Drift, a duo with percussionist Mark Sanders and a trio with Steve
Beresford and Francine Luce. In 1992 Pat Thomas formed the quartet Scatter with Phil Minton, Roger Turner and Dave Tucker. Pat Thomas has performed with Jim O'Rourke, Mats Gustafsson and Alexander Frangenheim in The Hague, Fred Frith, Shelly Hirsch, Carlos Zingaro in Stuttgart and Evan Parker, Phil Minton, John Russell and Roger Turner in Budapest.

Guillaume Viltaud has performed on bass with a wide host of notable
improvised music soloists including Sharon Gall, Moshi Honen, Gail
Brand, Ute Kanngiesser, Paul Abbott, Tony Marsh, Shabaka Hutchings,
John Russell, Phil Minton, Soizic Lebrat, John Butcher, Eddie Prevost
and Isabelle Duthoit among many others.