Rob Mackay is a composer, sound artist and performer. He gained a degree in Geology and Music at the University of Keele, studying composition there with Mike Vaughan, before going on to complete a Master’s and PhD with Andrew Lewis at the University of Wales, Bangor. Currently he is a Reader in Creative Music Technology at the University of Hull.

Recent projects have moved towards a cross-disciplinary approach, including theatre, audio/visual installation work, and human/computer interaction. Prizes and honours include: IMEB Bourges (1997 and 2001); EAR99 from Hungarian Radio (1999); Confluencias (2003); La Muse en Circuit (2004 and 2006). His work has received over 100 performances in 16 countries (including several performances on BBC Radio 3). Currently he is working with percussionist Evelyn Glennie on a composition project as part of Ruskin Rocks (http://www.leeds.ac.uk/ruskinrocks/).

He has held composer residencies at Slovak Radio (Bratislava), La Muse en Circuit (Paris), and the Tyrone Guthre Arts Centre (Ireland).

He is an improvisor working across many genres, and for several years played with the improvisation ensemble 'Imp'. He has also enjoyed improvising with Rhodri Davies and Jez Riley French. He has played, written and produced in a number of bands and ensembles, including the Welsh Hip-Hop collective 'Tystion' with whom he collaborated alongside John Cale on the film ‘A Beautiful Mistake’, as well as recording two John Peel sessions on BBC Radio 1 and supporting PJ Harvey. More recently, he has done session work for Gowel Owen and Euros Childs as well as playing in the Welsh Afrofunk outfit 'Drymbago'.

6 CDs including his compositions are available. More information and pieces at: www.digital-music-archives.com and http://www2.hull.ac.uk/fass/dramamusicandscreen/ourstaff/musicstaff/robmackay.aspx

some music & soundscapes/field-rec0rdings i have made over some time. usually unfinished. often inspired by or at least named after imp0rtant places, things, other species and humans in my life, mainly in mid-wales & east anglia. I also like field-rec0rdings and am interested in acoustic ecology, soundscape conservation and all that sort of thing.

Gizeh Records is an independent label based in Manchester, UK. Founded by Richard Knox in Leeds, 2004 and focusing on a fiercely DIY ethic, Gizeh has grown with it's artists over the years to form a strong community of musicians and artists from around the world, most of them collaborating together over the years across various projects, helping the label and those involved progress and evolve in an organic, inspiring and galvanising way.

It is our aim to conduct ourselves with modesty and humility in an ever changing industry. We put love, care and passion into our records and our artists and continue to push our ideals and our collective as far as we can within the means that we have. We have no care for genres or pigeon-holes - simply the noise of harmony and the harmony of noise and the inspiration and spirit of the people who are making that noise.

Fieldhead is Paul Elam, with Elaine Reynolds. Based in London and Manchester, UK, they produce electronic music that ranges from geography inspired tape loops to tense synth and violin led tracks. They have released three studio albums and a number of EPs (including 'Fury and Hecla', a collaborative release with Loscil). Their most recent album is ‘we’ve all been swimming’, released by Home Assembly Music on June 30th 2017.

The latest album marks something of a shift for Fieldhead. Previous releases have seen Elam take a detached view from the hillsides of West Yorkshire and Western Canada, but with his latest full length the subject matter is closer and more immediate. Tensely wound synths lead throughout the album, shifting from the breathless momentum of the opening track through to pulses reminiscent of Colin Stetson on ‘ton’. The unique violin playing of Elaine Reynolds glides sparingly across the record, tempering the constantly shifting arpeggios and accentuating the human elements within the record’s machine-like core. The haze found on previous records still hangs, but now it’s the haze of a crowded street or the last train home.

Folkroom Records is a boutique digital record label run by musician and producer Ben Walker and by writer/promoter Stephen Thomas.

Unfortunately we don't have time to respond to all the requests and messages we recieve on Soundcloud - if you're an artist looking to play for us, please do have a gander at the 'Contact Us' page on our website.

http://folkroom.co.uk

SONTAG SHOGUN (2006 - on)

Sontag Shogun was borne from the ashes of the fiery phoenix. This blazing winged creature produced a wet mewling pup, crawling blindly through the slick muck that was wet, ashy birth. Sontag Shogun is, put simply, an ongoing experiment. Somewhere between a lullaby and a dirge, Sontag Shogun takes their lullanoise and tries to find the strange, eery moments that exist within beauty. The snapshot before and after a bright, wide smile. The warm gleam of bones on the beach, picked clean of meat and tendons. 

Sontag Shogun is an ambient, electronic piano trio comprised of former members from [the] slowest runner [in all the world]. Pooling their influences from modern classical, improvised and ambient musical spheres, they create longform shape-shifting compositions that are at times lush and melodic as well as textural and unpredictable. They have improvised with artists as diverse as Matana Roberts, Tom Carter, Aki Onda as well as a collective of Japanese contemporary video artists. Sontag Shogun performs alongside black and white video-loop collages from films and archival footage, embracing the evocative and emotive nature of their melodic textures. They make music to dream away to, or from.

“There’s a tangible loneliness to Sontag Shogun's music, but there's a wistful loveliness present, too. The Brooklyn trio assumes a sort of songwriting assembly line, with Ian Temple's emotive, tremulous piano figures falling prey to Jesse Perlstein's legion of atmospheric, laptop-catalogue samples and the oscillator/tapes/electronic militia at Jeremy Young's command. Borne thereof are instrumentals that hover somewhere between quiet-storm raucous and New Age quiescent: giggly ivory-tickles brush elbows with industrial found sounds; funny-bone effects trill like cicadas or fireworks or distant slide whistles; sonatas and pitch-shifted drones suck face. Unlikely antecedents turn up in this mournful and meditative melee (The band counts composers like Arvo Part, Ryuichi Sakamoto, Philip Glass, and Max Richter among their influences.) Perhaps it's just that they seem to, for succumbing to a Sontag Shogun song is like wandering into a mist or thinny in a mystery novel: the first few seconds are universally objective, but beyond that, the experience is colored by what the listener brings to the table. ”    
-Ray Cummings, Village Voice

Even more simply put, Sontag Shogun is:

Jeremy Young, Jesse Perlstein & Ian Temple

for Booking/Inquiries email us at: sontagshoguninfo@gmail.com

Max Richter trained in composition and piano at Edinburgh University, at the Royal Academy of Music, and with Luciano Berio in Florence.

On completing his studies, Max co-founded the iconoclastic classical ensemble Piano Circus, where he stayed for ten years, commissioning and performing works by Arvo Pärt, Brian Eno, Philip Glass, Julia Wolfe and Steve Reich.

In the late 90s he worked with a number of electronic artists, notably Future Sound of London on their album 'Dead Cities". He subsequently collaborated with FSOL over a period of two years, also contributing to the albums "The Isness" and "The Peppermint Tree and Seeds of Superconsciousness". Max also collaborated with Mercury Prize winner Roni Size, on "In the Mode".

In June 2002, Max released his debut solo album, "memoryhouse", recorded with The BBC Philharmonic Orchestra. This was followed in March 2004 by FatCat's release of "The Blue Notebooks", with featured readings by Tilda Swinton.

In 2005 Max produced Vashti Bunyan's outstanding comeback album "Lookaftering".

2006 saw the release of "Songs From Before" based on Haruki Murakami texts read by Robert Wyatt. That same year, Max began performing "from The Art of Mirrors", an evolving score to previously unseen Super 8mm films of Derek Jarman.

Max's more recent work continues to stretch the notions of what Classical music is.  ‘24 Postcards In Full Colour’, released in August 2008, is an experimental work made up of 24 composed ringtones.

Max works widely in film music, installation and the theatre, most recently on INFRA, made with Wayne MacGregor and Julian Opie for The Royal Ballet, London. The Ballet was the subject of a BBC 'making of' documentary.

Max was named 2008 European Composer Of The Year for his score to Ari Folman's Waltz With Bashir, for which he was also nominated for the Prix France Musique.

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