Polar Bear

Event information

The Vortex City Sessions at Bishopsgate Institute: Polar Bear

Launching their new 10" vinyl release, this is Polar Bear's only London show of 2013. Support to be announced. This is a standing show.

Polar Bear are a perfect fit for a modern London, where influences constantly collide to create new and exciting hybrids. Their take on jazz is never limited by constricting notions of what a genre 'ought' to sound like. Led by drummer/bandleader Seb Rochford, with saxophonists Pete Wareham and Mark Lockheart, double bassist Tom Herbert and Leafcutter John on electronics and guitar, the group's music actively embraces the different musical worlds that surround it. From the raw energy of punk and hip-hop to the delicacy of modern experimental and classical music, their music confounds expectations by being both shamelessly melodic and gloriously uplifting.

Sebastian Rochford (percussion)
Pete Wareham (tenor/baritone saxophone)
Mark Lockheart (tenor saxophone)
Tom Herbert (double bass)
Leafcutter John (electronics/guitar)

Plus support from
Stefano Pilia

Bologna-based guitarist Stefano Pilia's solo work draws on his research into the sculputural dimensions of sound and it's relations with space, memory and time suspension - both through instrumental executional-experimental practices (mainly on guitar and dbass) and investigations into the recording and production process... He is one of the founder members of 3/4HadBeenEliminated, a group that synthesises improvisation, electro-acoustic composition and avant-rock sensibilties. Since 2008 he's been part of the Italian band Massimo Volume and since 2010 of In Zaire and has collaborated with Mike Watt (il sogno del marinaio), David Grubbs (bgp trio), David Tibet and ZU (zu93), Rokia Traorè and John Parish, Phill Niblock, Marina Rosenfeld, Andrea Belfi, Valerio Tricoli and Claudio Rocchetti (3/4HBE), Giuseppe Ielasi, and many more...

blindsuncrows.com

"Italian guitarist Stefano Pilia is a lyrical minimalist... His playing is poised, highly articulate and emotionally generous." Jon Dale / THE WIRE

"Pilia's subsonic drones are a thing of beauty; pulling in and pushing the listener away simultaneously, keeping him or her in a constant state of limbo.. in all things Stefano Pilia does, there is an understated and simple beauty beneath them. It acts like a silent guide, making sure everything goes off without a hitch." Brad Rose / Foxy Digitalis