Saturday 15 November
LONDON Institute of Contemporary Arts
Book tickets
7:30pm
Tickets: £22.20 + bkg
Live rendition of the genre-breaking drummer's forthcoming album, with 10 drummers
As part of the EFG London Jazz Festival, Asian Arts Agency and ICA present the premiere of Sarathy Korwar Drum Ensemble.
Genre-breaking drummer, producer and composer Sarathy Korwar presents a live rendition of his forthcoming album – the first release on his own new label – made up entirely of live drums, drum-triggered electronics and human voices.
For this special one-off show, the band will comprise 10+ drummers, playing an expansive version of the album.
Expect hypnotic and trance-inducing cyclical drum patterns – futuristic folk music that draws from South Asian temple procession rituals, jazz percussion ensembles and contemporary minimalism.
“His rhythmically intense, entrancing vision adds a whole new spin to the Indo-jazz continuum.” (⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ MOJO)
The album is performed as one continuous piece of music without breaks. Interludes and solo spotlights draw the focus on specific musicians and exchanges, all within the framework of a single running piece of music.
“Korwar takes in the political and radical history of jazz as a voice of the disenfranchised, and applies it to the Indian diaspora experience in contemporary Britain” (The Vinyl Factory)
Presented by the ICA and Asian Arts Agency, as part of EFG London Jazz Festival.
Born in the US, Sarathy Korwar grew up in Ahmedabad and Chennai in India. He began playing tabla aged 10, but was also drawn to the American music that he heard on the radio and leaking through the doorway of his local jazz music shop (Ahmad Jamal and John Coltrane were early discoveries). At 17, Korwar moved to Pune to study Environmental Science, but instead dedicated his time to music, practising tabla under the tutelage of Rajeev Devasthali, translating his skills to the western drum kit and playing as a session musician.
On completing these studies, he moved to London where he trained as a classical tabla player under the guidance of Sanju Sahai at SOAS, focusing on the adaptation of Indian classical rhythmic material to non-Indian percussion instruments.
Korwar has since established himself as one of the most original and compelling voices in the UK jazz scene, leading the UPAJ Collective – a loose band of South Asian jazz and Indian classical musicians brought together through a love of collaboration and improvisation who set up a residency at the Jazz Café in London.
Korwar has collaborated with the likes of Shabaka Hutchings (The Comet Is Coming), clarinettist Arun Ghosh and producer Hieroglyphic Being, as well as groups Penya and Ill Considered. He has toured with Kamasi Washington, Anoushka Shankar, Yussef Kamaal and Moses Boyd.