MUSHMOUTH : Elaine Mitchener – Phil Minton – Steve Beresford – Tuesday 12 April – 8pm – £7/5


MUSHMOUTH
 mushmouth. noun. A person who talks indistinctly and slurringly: Say it again so I can hear it, mushmouth (1950s+)
Vocalist Elaine Mitchener with legendary free-improvisers vocalist Phil Minton and Lo-fi gadgetry wizard Steve Beresford.

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Elaine Mitchener is a vocalist noted for her unique mixture of styles
ranging from contemporary classical, gospel, jazz, free-improvisation and
contemporary dance. Associated musicians include Irvine Arditti, Steve
Beresford, Brodsky Quartet, John Butcher, Olly Coates, Attila Csihar, Dam
van Huynh, Max Eastley, John Edwards, Luc Ex, Bobby Few, Luca Francesconi,
Heiner Goebbels, Henry Grimes, Tony Hymas, Christian Marclay, Joanna
McGregor, Phil Minton, David Moss, Lauren Newton, Maggie Nichols, Evan
Parker, Alasdair Roberts, Mark Sanders, David Toop, Matthew Wright, and
Jason Yarde. Elaine has worked with producers Sound UK, Third Ear,
Muziektheater Transparant, festivals hcmf//, Meltdown (SBC), Spitalfields
Music, Sounds New, La Dynamo, Ars Musica, Operadagen, and presented work at
Weseburg MOMA, Hepworth (Wakefield) and Tate Britain, Hayward And Raven Row
(London) galleries.

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Phil Minton comes from Torquay. He played trumpet and sang with the Mike Westbrook Band in the early 60s- Then in dance and rock bands in Europe for the later of part of the decade. He returned to England in 1971, rejoining Westbrook and was involved in many of his projects until the mid 1980′s. For most of the last forty years, Minton has been working as a improvising singer in lots of groups, orchestras, and situations, all over the place. Numerous composers have written music especially for his extended vocal techniques. He has a quartet with Veryan Weston, Roger Turner and John Butcher, and ongoing duos, trios and quartets with above and many other musicians.  Since the eighties, His Feral Choir, where he voice-conducts workshops and concerts for anyone who wants to sing, has performed in over twenty countries.

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Steve Beresford Internationally known as a free improviser on piano and electronics, Steve Beresford has also scored feature films and music for TV and commercials. He has worked with hundreds of musicians, including The Slits, Han Bennink, Christine Tobin, Ivor Cutler, Prince Far-I, Alan Hacker, Ray Davies, Ilan Volkov, David Toop, Najma Akhtar, Evan Parker, Adrian Sherwood, The Flying Lizards, Otomo Yoshihide and John Zorn and has an extensive discography. He was born in Wellington, Shropshire in 1950. In 1974 he moved to London, playing piano with improvisers like Derek Bailey and also trumpet with the notorious Portsmouth Sinfonia, which included Brian Eno and Gavin Bryars. Steve has had a long association with Swiss artist/musician Christian Marclay, performing realisations of Marclay’s ‘Screen Play’, ‘Ephemera’, ‘Graffiti Composition’, ‘Shuffle’, ‘Pianorama’ and ‘Everyday’, sometimes solo and sometimes with groups. 2014 sees the third tour of ‘Indeterminacy’, in which comedian Stewart Lee reads one-minute stories by John Cage whilst Beresford and fellow pianist Tania Chen play music. Beresford plays with and conducts the London Improvisers Orchestra every month. He also regularly collaborates with musicians such as Elaine Mitchener, Blanca Regina, John Butcher, Satoko Fukuda and Shabaka Hutchings, playing at venues like Café Oto in Dalston, London. Steve was awarded a Paul Hamlyn award for composers in 2012.