Giovanni Di Domenico, a pianist, performer and composer with a discography that dates back to the end of the last decade and that opens up between jazz, free improvisation, minimalism, drone and other material that dwells in the cracks between genres, free improvisation, minimalism, drone and other material that dwells in the cracks between genres and that has served as a compass for his label Silent Water and encounters with people like Jim O’Rourke, Tetuzi Akyiama, Tatsuhisa Yamamoto and Manuel Mota. BS

More than an explorer of the guitar in its most formal and aseptic sense, Manuel Mota is passionate about the instrument, whose meticulous study of its characteristics is always full of lyricism. With the more romantic and dusty tradition of the blues haunting his work in an expressive yet apparently intangible way, Mota is one of the leading figures of improvisation on European soil, and one of the most vital guitarists of the last two decades anywhere.

Elusive to any vague cataloguing or the lazy ruminations of his own language, Mota continually challenges himself in his own gravitational centre, always finding spaces to explore in a music that is profoundly his own. The last few times we’ve seen him solo, we’ve either caught him immersed in electricity evoking the last chords of the guitar hero, or in the tender suspension of languid notes. Always unpredictable and always a must. BS

Maria da Rocha’s music has emerged from an intimate connection to the violin and from the fascination how analog synthetised noises can resemble those from everyday life: nature, machines and other sounding objects, partly with a life of their own.

Maria da Rocha plays violin & viola, researches, teaches, creates mostly in the field of new, experimental & electroacoustic music. She played various works solo with orchestra or as tutti and collaborated with ensembles in new music festivals in Portugal, Germany, Sweden, Belgium, United Kingdom and Poland. Maria is active in a variety of musical styles and collaborations with other arts (MisoMusic, Monstra, DocLisboa). Her multimedia compositions emerged in collaboration and have been presented in various festivals, such as the release of the album Pink: daRocha/Horn (viola and live electronics) edited by Creative Sources. Her solo album Beetroot&OtherStories (violin&electronics) was recorded at awarded composer residencies at EMS, Stockholm and mastered in VICC, Centre for Composers in Visby and edited by Shhpuma Label. Maria studied in Lisbon (ESML), Aveiro (UA), Berlin (UdK),Belfast (SARC). She is currently finishing her Doctor in Musical Arts on Violin & Electronics.