2009 Cheltenham Jazz Festival brings two concert to the Xposed Club. In the first concert Kira Kira + Longstone + Akiko Cheltenham meets Iceland in a feast of electronic experimentalism. The second concert will present an evening of the finest contemporary music with Ernst Reijsegar solo + The Convergence Quartet + Alex Ward/Chris Cundy duo.

The Convergence Quartet – Taylor Ho Bynum (cornet), Harris Eisenstadt (drums), Alexander Hawkins (piano), and Dominic Lash (double bass) – brings together four of a new young generation of improvisers who draw on both US and European creative traditions in their playing. Despite the band’s youth, its members’ individual performance and recording credits already take in many of the seminal names in creative music (including Anthony Braxton, John Butcher, Lol Coxhill, Bill Dixon, Evan Parker, Sam Rivers, and Cecil Taylor).

The evening will include another outstanding Mark Unsworth set design and an interactive photography/image projection created by Photography students of University of Gloucestershire to delight and entertain you.

For thirty years Paul Dunmall has carved out a reputation for himself and is now widely recognised as one of the most uncompromising and talented reed players on the International jazz/improvised music scene.Whether playing in small groups or big bands his musical sensitivity and imagination combined with a powerful sound to make him one of the most distinctive improvisers playing today.

Paul Dunmall and Paul Rogers have been making music together since the 1980s as a duo, as half of the co-operative quartet Mujician, and in larger groups organised by Dunmall, Keith Tippett and others.

Born in London and raised in Cadiz, Southern Spain, Beatrix Ward-Fernandez began classical violin training on her return to England. Residing in Sheffield, her interest in experimental and improvised musics led almost inevitably to her involvement in the fertile local creative scene, playing violin and castanets!

Long attracted to the sound of the Theremin, she became fascinated with the possibilities it presented. It seemed to her that there had been little or no exploration of its integration and use within acoustic/experimental ensembles. Developing new techniques to meet the demands of these musics became an abiding interest.

Over the past few years she has recorded and/or performed with a vast number of creative artists, including Martin Archer, Mick Beck, Pat Thomas, J.D. Parran, Phillip Thomas, Jez riley French, Pleasure-Drenching Improvers, Damo Suzuki, Chris Corsano and Okkyung Lee. In July 2007 she performed with her regular trio of Derek Saw and Charlie Collins at the Theremin symposium "Hands Off".

Nik Turner (saxophones) was a founder member of the pivotal 1970’s British counter-culture, space rock group Hawkwind penning some of their most influential songs including ‘Brainstorm’ and ‘Master of the Universe’. During the 80’s he then went on to form the post-punk anarcho-political group Inner City Unit famous for their perverse homemade videos and their self proclaimed gambits towards the demons of the music industry. Turner has also made occasional guest appearances with, amongst others, The Damned and Sham 69.

Chris Cundy (bass clarinet) tours regularly with Mercury Music Award nominated orchestral/pop band Guillemots. He also appears on both of their recent albums under Polydor. Cundy is also involved with many other experimental and improvised groups where he frequently works with Guillemots lead singer Fyfe Dangerfield as well as many other musicians. He has made appearances at numerous experimental music festivals including Venn and Supersonic.

Pat Thomas (electronics + piano) is known for his innovations within urban dub and jungle/electro music. He has recorded a number of solo projects including ‘New Jazz Jungle’ and the mystic Sufi inspired ‘Jungle Sufi’. Collaborations have encompassed projects alongside influential sound artists such as Joe Gallivan and Rhys Chatham. As a major figure within the improvisation scene he has appeared with Lol Coxhill and Tony Oxley amongst many many others over the years. He recently released ‘Pat Thomas Plays the Music of Derek Bailey and Thelonious Monk’ for the independent FMR label.

Steve Noble (drums) is a leading exponent of improvised and new jazz drumming and recent projects include an exciting new trio with Ingrid Laubrock and John Edwards. During the 1980’s he was a member of the band Rip Rig and Panic with Neneh Cherry. Noble has also worked very closely with the composer Simon H Fell on various projects involving improvised and compositional cross over. His powerful approach to rhythm sets him apart as a player whose music is enriched by the beat, the swing and the shuffle in a very contemporary way.

Friday 5th December a Christmas Special saw the legend Lol Coxhill join the great Veryan Weston and the very very special duo of Mike Adcock and Clive Bell make it a night of two duos. Be prepared for a night of outstanding music making.

Lol Coxhill and Veryan Weston have been playing with together since 1974. They made their first public recordings together (Joy of Paranoia and Digswell Duets) and also collaborated with various visual artists on performance projects. They also co-composed for Derek Jarman's film – Carravaggio, as well as stuff on Granada television with Lol's group – Standard Conversions.

Mike Adcock and Clive Bell have been playing together, on and off, for over twenty years. In the mid-80's they formed the band Accordions Go Crazy, recording three albums for the Trikont label in Germany. Since then they have been involved separately in various solo and group projects as well as continuing to work together in a number of ways. Clive Bell has played for several years in Jah Wobble's band Invaders of the heart and has worked with Paul Schütze, Bill Laswell and Jeff Beck. Mike Adcock, as well as playing with blues/swing band The Cadillac Kings, has developed a long standing interest in Norwegian music through a number of collaborations with Norwegian musicians, including Nils Økland, Karl Seglem and Terje Isungset. In 2002 the CD Sleep It Off by Adcock and Bell received wide acclaim, including being voted one of the The Wire magazine's albums of the year. More recently they have both been performing with the German-based improvising group Paper Factory, along with Sylvia Hallett, Hans Joachim Irmler (from Faust) and Mike Svoboda from the USA, releasing a CD Schlachtfest-Session 1.

Roshi feat Pars Radio is a collaboration between the Iranian vocalist Roshi and sound artist Graham Dowdall but also features Classical/experimental cello from Rachel Threlfal.

Gagarin is Graham Dowdall's latest solo project. He has worked extensively with legendary artists like Nico and John Cale and recently Pere Ubu. Xposed Club is privileged to be able to present Dowdall performing work from his latest solo album of experimental electronica.

In the niche-oriented world of major-league jazz, it's almost unfashionable to be so multi-faceted a player as Han Bennink. Bennink is one of the unfortunately rare musicians whose abilities and interests span the music's entire spectrum, from Dixieland to free. His straight-ahead playing is absolutely convincing — his time is solid, his sense of swing strong, and his technique flawless. He also possesses the requisite qualities of a free jazz virtuoso; Bennink's ability to interact quickly and creatively with horn players and pianists is great, as is his ear for timbral contrasts.

What ultimately makes Bennink special is his manifest love for the music, a love that inclines him to tear down the cardboard walls that too often separate different schools of jazz. At his best, with colleagues who share his all-encompassing stylistic embrace, Bennink plays the continuum of jazz as an instrument unto itself.

Trio Tarana is led by percussionist / composer Ravish Momin who currently resides in New York City. He was born in India, and spent his childhood in Mumbai, & Bahrain. Since he had also absorbed diverse influences growing up, he was not prepared to discard them, for one specific musical idiom.

Therefore, the creation of Trio Tarana, in 2003, was a natural culmination of all of those diverse influences. "Tarana" itself refers to a song-style in North Indian Classical Music, where nonsense syllables or mnemonic drum sounds are used to spontaneously create a fluid chant or composition. In keeping with their namesake, the trio primarily utilizes Indian and East-Asian rhythms as the foundation for a new creative musical experience; they also employ compositions that seamlessly blend written material with spontaneous group interaction.

Of their debut CD, AllAboutJazz.com had said: “It is fair to say that Tarana is without precedent in the world of improvised music. A true synthesis of North African, South and East Asian motifs with classical organization and the immediacy of free improvisation has probably not existed prior to “Climbing the Banyan Tree.”

Corbett is an articulated transmitter of melodic virtuosity, which he carries for long distances without sacrificing his quest for timbral purity, explicated through post-Davis plasticity and more idiosyncratic configurations where multiphonics and gentle exhalations get a little space under the spotlight. Stephens' bodily sound is adequately harmonious, filling the record with constructive relationships based upon a fundamental immediacy which brings the listener to instantly metabolize its byproducts; both by plucking and through short fragments of arco work, the bassist manages to create a small, protective world of his own - yet open to all visitors. Tony Marsh’s delicately articulate touch is a definite plus, his extraordinary inventiveness not diminished by the total control that his technique exercises on an otherwise intense necessity of tripping outside the canons of jaz

Born in London, 1971, Gail has been a trombonist since the age of 9 and has been playing on the international Jazz and Improvised Music scene since the early 1990s. She performs solo and with many international improvisers. She has played all styles of music, live and in the studio. As well as a trombonist, Gail works as a qualified Music Therapist and is professor in Group Improvisation skills on the Music Therapy MA course at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, London. Gail is a member of Executive Committee of the British Musicians Union. Simon Picard will accompany her on tenor saxophone.

Henry Grimes is a legendary bass player from the Albert Ayler band. He was an A-list jazz musician in the 1950s and '60s. He played with everyone including the swing master Benny Goodman.

For about a decade, Henry Grimes was one of the most in-demand bassists on the jazz scene. Beginning in 1957, he worked extensively in the groups of baritone saxophonist Gerry Mulligan and tenor saxophonist Sonny Rollins. While continuing to associate with more mainstream players, in 1961 Grimes performed on pianist Cecil Taylor’s recording session for the Impulse label (issued as Gil Evans: Into the Hot) and worked with clarinetist Perry Robinson. In 1963 he renewed his relationship with Sonny Rollins, joining a group that also included trumpeter Don Cherry and drummer Billy Higgins, both formerly with saxophonist Ornette Coleman’s quartet. This moved Grimes more into the realm of the experimental and as the sixties progressed, he played with the influential avant-garde tenor saxophonists Albert Ayler, Archie Shepp, and Pharoah Sanders, as well as with Cherry and Taylor. He also participated on numerous important recording sessions for the ESP and Impulse labels. At the height of his activity and without warning, he left New York for the west coast and the final documented appearance of Grimes seems to have been in April 1969 in San Francisco as part of saxophonist Archie Shepp's ensemble which performed at the Both/And club. Following that, he dropped off the jazz radar screen. Until very recently, the curious death notice in Cadence closed the book on a great creative musician.

In 2002 he celebrated a great come back.

He did a talk at the University and then held a concert at Xposed Club the next day.

Jazz fans are invited to hear The Imaginary String Trio play on Friday 19 October at Pittville Studios. The strings will be provide by violinist Philip Wachsmann, Dominic Lash on contra bass and Bruno Guastalla on the cello.

The Imaginary String Trio play spontaneously improvised acoustic music that can turn on a dime from delicately beautiful structures to gritty, aggressive textures. The players' experience ranges from modern composition, to jazz, French chanson and beyond. All of these inform the music they make together, but most important is their interaction in the moment.

Philipp Wachsmann has played with many of the world’s top improvising musicians including the great Derek Bailey and Paul Rutherford, Alexander von Schlilppenbach, Barry Guy, Evan Parker and Eddie Prevost.

Music fans were in for a treat when Guillemots singer Fyfe Dangerfield played at the University of Gloucestershire with his exciting new band, The Gannets on Friday 5 October.

Fyfe is an English musician and songwriter, best known as the founder member of the Brit Award nominated band, The Guillemots. He played at the first BBC Electric Proms when the band performed seven tracks with a full orchestra and has performed at Wembley Area as a supporting act for Snow Patrol as well as performing live with political song writer, Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly.

The Gannets, which includes members Steve Noble, Alex Ward and former University of Gloucestershire student Chris Cundy, are an experimental band that emerged as part of London’s improvised music circuit. They started playing gigs at the legendary north London film and music club, ‘The Klinker’ in 2004. Prior to this, Chris established a space for experimental music in Cheltenham called The Birdsnest, set up in a small children's theatre in the town with the idea of promoting unusual music performances that often incorporated theatre props and homemade films or slideshows. This gave The Gannets a real chance to establish themselves as a band.

Trash Money, which performed at the Xposed Club 21 Sep 2007, is an up and coming band, formed by Joe Wilson, course leader of the popular music degree and former member of the band Sneaker Pimps.

Trash Money was formed in 1999, with their first single You Lied Satan was named single of the week by NME. Their first album, Trash Money was released in 2006 and is an eclectic range of rock, electro, punk and disco tracks with a nostalgic twist. Fans of the band include Lauren Laverne, The Mighty Boosh and Alan McGee.

Joe was joined by Chris Tate and David Westlake who also played with Sneaker Pimps, along with Mary Dolittle Slade and Cary Creed.