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Arts Council England is a non-departmental public body of the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. It was formed in 1994 when the Arts Council of Great Britain was divided into three separate bodies for England, Scotland and Wales. The arts funding system in England underwent considerable reorganisation in 2002 when all of the regional arts boards were subsumed into Arts Council England and became regional offices of the national organisation.
The culture of Birmingham is characterised by a deep-seated tradition of individualism and experimentation, and the unusually fragmented but innovative culture that results has been widely remarked upon by commentators. Writing in 1969, the New York-based urbanist Jane Jacobs cast Birmingham as one of the world's great examples of urban creativity: surveying its history from the 16th to the 20th centuries she described it as a "great, confused laboratory of ideas", noting how its chaotic structure as a "muddle of oddments" meant that it "grew through constant diversification". The historian G. M. Young – in a classic comparison later expanded upon by Asa Briggs – contrasted the "experimental, adventurous, diverse" culture of Birmingham with the "solid, uniform, pacific" culture of the outwardly similar city of Manchester. The American economist Edward Gleason wrote in 2011 that "cities, the dense agglomerations that dot the globe, have been engines of innovation since Plato and Socrates bickered in an Athenian marketplace. The streets of Florence gave us the Renaissance and the streets of Birmingham gave us the Industrial Revolution", concluding: "wandering these cities ... is to study nothing less than human progress."
Soweto Kinch is a British jazz alto saxophonist and rapper.
Jazzwise Publications Limited was a UK-based specialist jazz music publisher and education company. It was founded in 1984 as a mail-order company promoting jazz and improvisation through catalogues and short courses and workshops for musicians. Jazzwise had three main areas of interest: Jazzwise Education, which runs an annual Summer School for jazz musicians; Jazzwise Direct, which publishes and sells sheet music, books, software and other music-related items; and Jazzwise, the biggest-selling jazz magazine in Britain.
Band on the Wall is a live music venue in the Northern Quarter of Manchester, England.
Gwilym Simcock is a Welsh pianist and composer working in both jazz and classical music, often blurring any distinction between the two musical forms.
Bristol is a city in South West England. As the largest city in the region it is a centre for the arts and sport. The region has a distinct West Country dialect.
Huw Warren is a Welsh jazz pianist and composer whose work crosses several genres.
Django Bates is a British composer, multi-instrumentalist, band leader and educator. He plays the piano, keyboards and the tenor horn and writes large-scale compositions on commission. He has been described as "One of the most talented musicians Britain has produced, and his work covers the entire spectrum of jazz, from early jazz through to bebop and free jazz to jazz-rock fusion."
Birmingham Jazz is a voluntary, non-profit organisation responsible for promoting and commissioning jazz and related contemporary music in the UK.
The Manchester International Festival is a biennial international arts festival, with a specific focus on original new work, held in the English city of Manchester. The festival is a biennial event, first taking place in June–July 2007, and subsequently recurring in the summers of 2009, 2011, 2013, 2015, 2017 and 2019. MIF19 took place from 4 to 21 July 2019. The organisation is based in Blackfriars House, adjacent to Blackfriars Bridge but is due to move to a new £110 million new home, The Factory, by the beginning of 2020.
Mark Lockheart is a British jazz tenor saxophonist who was a member of the Loose Tubes big band during the 1980s.
The Bracknell Jazz Festival was a major showcase for British modern jazz in the 1980s. The festival was known for attracting a largish audience for free improvisation, modern jazz composition and all kinds of British modern jazz in general.
Neil Yates is a British jazz and folk musician.
Neil Cowley is an English contemporary pianist and composer. He has also released music as part of Fragile State, the Green Nuns of the Revolution, and the Neil Cowley Trio. With his trio, he appeared on Later... with Jools Holland in April 2008 and won the 2007 BBC Jazz Award for best album for Displaced. In 2018, Cowley announced he was working on a new electronic focused solo project. In 2020 Cowley announced his debut solo album 'Hall of Mirrors'
Sarah Gillespie is a British American singer songwriter and writer based in London. She has four albums, known for combining poetic lyrics with folk, blues and elements of jazz. Her debut collection of poetry, Queen Ithaca Blues, was published by Albion Beatnik Press. Gillespie's fourth album, Wishbones, was arranged and co-produced by Mercury nominated pianist and composer Kit Downes. Her band features Kit Downes - organ and piano, James Maddren - drums, Ruth Goller - bass, Chris Montague - guitar and special guest Laura Jurd - trumpet. Wishbones was launched at the Southbank Centre's Purcell Room on October 29, 2018.
Maciek Pysz is a jazz musician, guitarist and composer. He is known for his clear lyrical phrasing, his virtuosity and his imaginative, cinematic compositions inspired by people, places and experiences.
The Factory is a cultural space currently being built in Manchester, UK, which is to be the permanent home of the Manchester International Festival. It is inspired by the city's history of innovation and MIF's "reputation for big-hitting world premieres, envelope-pushing new work" and "being one of the leading worldwide incubators for new, cutting-edge art."
Tomorrow's Warriors is an innovative jazz music education and artist development organisation that was co-founded in 1991 by Janine Irons and Gary Crosby, committed to increasing diversity across the arts through jazz, with a special focus on those "from the African diaspora and female musicians and those whose financial or other circumstances might lock them out of opportunities to pursue a career in the music industry". Crosby drew inspiration from having been a member of the Jazz Warriors, a London-based group of musicians that in the 1980s showcased many young Black British musicians who went on to achieve international success. Tomorrow's Warriors, which has a multiracial make-up, provides a platform for young musicians wishing to pursue a career in jazz, and aims "to inspire, foster and grow a vibrant community of artists, audiences and leaders who together will transform the lives of future generations by increasing opportunity, diversity and excellence in and through jazz." Alumni of Tomorrow's Warriors have gone on to win several awards.
Victoria ("Tori") Freestone is a British saxophonist, flautist, violinist and composer. She has performed at the vanguard of British jazz since 2009 as highly respected band leader and sidewoman, known for her robust tenor sound and melodic invention. Her Trio albums, released in 2014 and 2016, have both been awarded at least 4 stars. The Guardian critic John Fordham described her first album "In The Chop House" as "an imposingly original sound". In 2017 Freestone was shortlisted for a Fellowship in Jazz Composition supported by PRS for Music Foundation, UK Arts Foundation. That year Freestone was also nominated in the Parliamentary Jazz Awards 2017 in the Jazz Instrumentalist of the Year category.