Live performance
Saturday 26th September, 7:30-11:30pm
The Goods Shed
13 piece ensemble with 9 saxophones, led by Will Gregory, explore the canon of influential American composer Moondog (aka The Viking of Sixth Avenue), the blind American musician and composer, who influenced everyone from Leonard Bernstein to Philip Glass.
In 1994, 5 years before his death, the blind musician, composer, and performer Moondog collaborated with London Saxophonic, recording Sax pax for a Pax – an album blending classical & jazz. The album marked Moondog's re-emergence into the American jazz market
In this special performance, London Saxophonic bring these extraordinary compositions back to life. Opening tonight is innovative saxophonist/composer Robert Stillman (The Smile) who fuses American Folk Music, Jazz, Minimalism, and experimental electronic music with improvised cassette tape symphonies. Awesome, playful and virtuosic. Plus, DJ set in the bar after from David Wrench, the innovative Welsh record producer and musician, who has worked with everyone from David Byrne to Blur and Frank Ocean.
London Saxophonic
London Saxophonic is a saxophone ensemble (with piano, bass guitar, and percussion) begun by Gareth Brady, Will Gregory and Simon Haram, while they were studying at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. They made their debut in 1994 on Atlantic Records with Sax Pax for a Sax, a collaboration with Moondog,[1] who composed all of the works on the album. In 1998, they went to the now-defunct label Tring (primarily a budget-label of technically primitive, cheaply recorded classical music) with a Michael Nyman retrospective titled An Eye for a Difference, produced by David Roach.
Will Gregory
Will Gregory formed electronic pop group Goldfrapp in 1999 alongside bandmate Alison Goldfrapp. Together they have released seven albums, most recently 'Silver Eye' in 2017 which secured the band a ‘Best Producer’ Brit Award nomination. The band have scored a string of hits including 'Strict Machine', 'Ooh La La', 'Lovely Head' and 'A&E'. The multi-platinum selling band have been nominated for the Mercury Prize, multiple Grammy Awards and won an Ivor Novello for 'Strict Machine'. Goldfrapp have also scored the soundtracks to the films 'My Summer of Love' and 'Nowhere Boy' and wrote the music for Carrie Cracknell's National Theatre acclaimed production of Medea.
Outside of Goldfrapp, Will Gregory has performed with artists including Tears for Fears, Peter Gabriel, The Cure, Portisheadand Michael Nyman. His first opera Picard in Space premiered at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in 2011 and in 2014 he was commissioned to produce a piece for orchestra and Moog, performed by the BBC Concert Orchestra. Gregory also wrote part of the score for the National Theatre of Scotland's James III trilogy in 2016 which was subsequently performed nationally as well as the music for the Royal Shakespeare Company’s production of King John in 2019. Gregory recently scored the BBC Worldwide TV series 'Serengeti' (executive produced by Simon Fuller) as well as the BBC nature series ‘Spy In The Wild 2’, alongside 'The Nature Of Why' with the British Paraorchestra at the Bristol Old Vic. HIs other passion is "The Will Gregory Moog Ensemble", a ten piece orchestra of Mono Synths toured last year including dates at the Barbican in London, and the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg.
Tickets £18