Time: 8.00 – 11.00pm

Tickets: £13

Personnel

Alcyona Mick – piano
Tori Freestone – sax 
Dave Whitford – bass
Tim Giles – drums

We are glad that we can get this quartet to the East Side . They were due to play last year but unfortunately Alcyona was ill and unable to make it so Tori played as a trio

Tori and Alcyona formed their duo in 2015 after being invited to perform together at the Manchester Jazz Festival. Both much in demand players on the London jazz scene, the two have known each other for years, working together in many different ensembles including Ingrid and Christine Jensen, Yazz Ahmed, Natacha Atlas, Nikki Iles Jazz Orchestra, Cleo Laine/Alec Dankworth band, and are permanent members of the London Jazz Orchestra. They recorded their debut album ‘Criss Cross’ at the famous Artesuono Studios in Italy in 2017, released in 2018 to wide critical acclaim followed by a tour of the UK, Germany and Spain with live radio performances.
The duo has a very spontaneous, interactive approach and shares a large range of musical influences that fall not only within the jazz genre, including English folk, Brazilian music, Arabic music, free playing, Monk and more. Performances have included Birmingham Symphony Hall, Museo del Grifo (Spain), Emotion Festival (Bremen), Halle 242 (Hamburg), Salle Krieps auditorium (Luxembourg) and the Manchester and London Jazz Festivals. In 2020 they won the Help Musicians ‘Do it Differently’ and ‘Record and release’ awards to write and collaborate on a second album. The new music was premiered in live/streamed concerts including the Up and Down Festival (Spain) and the Royal Albert Hall in collaboration with Steinway. The latter premiere resulted in the Ivor Novello Award and featured on BBC Radio 3 November 2022.

They have since expanded the duo to a quartet with long term collaborators Dave Whitford and Tim Giles.

Tori Freestone features in many of the UK’s most exciting ensembles: The UK All Star Big Band with Hermeto Pascoal, the Julian Siegel Jazz Orchestra, Ivo Neame’s Quintet/Octet, Andre Canniere’s Sextet, Rory Simmons, Neil Yates’ ‘Surroundings’, the Asaf Sirkis Quartet, the London Jazz Orchestra, ‘Compassionate Dictatorship’, Cuban group ‘Orquesta Timbala’ and a duo with pianist Alcyona Mick alongside musicians such as Iain Ballamy, Stan Sulzman, Norma Winstone, Dave Holland, Jim Hart, Julian Siegel, Jasper Hoiby, Jamie Cullum, Andy Sheppard and Jason Yarde.  Performances include the Cheltenham, Brecon, North Sea, Haskovo (Bulgaria), Elb, Sudtirol, Leibnitz, La Laguna (Spain) Jazz festivals, the Binhuis, Ronnie Scott’s, La Zorro y El Cuervo (Cuba), DB museum (Nuremberg) plus tours of the UK, Canary Islands, Portugal, Norway, Germany and Austria and recordings/interviews for Jazz FM, Radio 3, Radio 2, Loop, Edition and Whirlwind Recordings. She leads her own trio and their debut album (2014) and second album ‘El Barranco’ (2016) attracted wide acclaim in the UK and abroad.  Tori composed a commission for the trio for the 2014 EFG London Jazz Festival which was performed at the QEH supporting Henri Texier and in she was shortlisted for the 2017 Arts Foundation Award for Jazz Composition and the Parliamentary Jazz Award for Jazz Instrumentalist of the Year 2017.

“Freestone has clearly listened widely, but her musicality and broad experiences have stirred all that input into an imposingly original sound”, John Fordham, The Guardian 4 star review

“a flute and reeds player of nicely sinuous melodic invention” – The Telegraph

Alcyona is a pianist working at the forefront of the London Jazz scene… Recently nominated for a Parliamentary Jazz Instrumentalist Award, she is a member of the London Jazz Orchestra, Tori Freestone/Alcyona Mick Duo, Brigitte Beraha Lucid Dreamers, Casimir Connection, Perfect Stranger, Josephine Davies Enso Ensemble, Randolph Matthews band, Paul Clarvis/Stuart Hall trio and has worked with Anglo/Egyptian artist Natacha Atlas for many years, performing worldwide. She has played on TRT music series in Istanbul with many Turkish artists, and performed with a wide array of other musicians including Yazz Ahmed, Henry Lowther’s Still Waters, Kate Shortt, Ingrid and Christine Jensen/Whirlwind bigband, Nikki Iles bigband, Eddie Parker, Alec Dankworth/Cleo Laine band, Mircan Kaya, Bachar Zarkan, Jerry Dammers Spatial aka Orchestra, Ibrahim Maalouf, Macadi Nahhas, Zoe Rahman and many more.

As a composer she has a Master’s in Composing music for film from the National Film and Television school. She has written and produced music for many independent short films, documentaries, animation and silent cinema. She won an award for Best Soundtrack at the Anima Mundi International Festival, Brazil.

‘world class ingenuity’   the Guardian

‘Alcyona Mick is an unusual powerhouse of a talent’ – MOJO

Picture of Tori and Aly at God’s Own Junkyard by Daniel Devlin