12 Songs of Serious
It’s been a busy year – we’ve brought hundreds of shows and thousands of artists to stages across the UK and beyond. Thank you for all your support!
To celebrate the holiday season, we’ve handpicked tracks from 12 brilliant artists who we’re working with now and in the future. We hope you enjoy listening over the festive break!
Samara Joy
After winning two GRAMMYs – Best Jazz Vocal Album and the auspicious Best New Artist award – and selling out her EFG London Jazz Festival show in 2023, the “silky-voiced rising star” (The New York Times) Samara Joy, returns in 2024 for her first ever UK tour.
Rhiannon Giddens
A two-time GRAMMY Award-winning singer, instrumentalist and MacArthur “Genius” grant recipient, Rhiannon Giddens has made a singular, iconic career out of stretching her brand of folk music, with its miles-deep historical roots and contemporary sensibilities, into just about every field imaginable. Following her sold out Union Chapel show earlier this year, Giddens returns to the UK in 2024 with a headline Barbican show, which sees the first UK outing of her latest album and first solo release in 6 years You're the One (Nonesuch). Giddens follows this with a show at Birmingham Town Hall on Thursday 22 February.
Book tickets for 2024
KODO
Japan’s legendary Kodo drummers return to London with two physically stunning and musically sensational shows at the Barbican. Reworking their treasure trove of signature pieces created across 40 years of international performances, experience a spectacular feat of physical endurance and musicality. The Japanese word ‘kodo’ can be translated two ways — ‘heartbeat’ and ‘children of the drum’ — both of which embody the essence of the renowned taiko drumming troupe.
With the first night sold out, final tickets are now remaining for the second night - don't miss seeing the soul-stirring rhythm of life first hand.
Ana Carla Maza
With over 150 concerts performed in 2022, following her second album Bahia and a captivating performance at WOMAD this summer, Ana Carla Maza’s immersion in her music is, and has always been, absolute. In her latest album Caribe, she has thrown caution to the wind, and unlike her previous solo work has solar-powered her songbook, and brought together a Latin jazz band, allowing her to re-colour and patch together her joyful memories of growing up, during the late 1990s, in the wildly exuberant city of Havana.
With only 28 years to her name, Caribe is Ana Carla's third album release in 3 years. She celebrates this with a return to the UK for her biggest tour yet, coming this Spring 2024.
Chilly Gonzales
2023 saw the year of Chilly Gonzales' venture into "the language of Voltaire, Flaubert, Baudelaire and Bangalter" as he released his first album written and performed in French, entitled French Kiss. In its first UK outing late this year, Gonzo performed to an intimate sold-out crowd at EartH. We're looking forward to the next time he visits the UK!
Listen to French Kiss here
Julian Lage
American jazz guitarist and composer Julian Lage returns to London for his biggest show to date as part of his Speak to Me Tour. Hailed as one of the most prodigious guitarists of his generation and "highest category of improvising musicians" (New Yorker), Julian Lage has spent more than a decade searching through the myriad strains of American musical history via impeccable technique, free association and a spirit of infinite possibility.
Imbued with vibrant colours and exquisite interplay, Lage's latest album, the now GRAMMY-nominated The Layers (2023) was a stunning companion piece to his acclaimed 2022 release, View With A Room – filled with incredible rhythmic and orchestral sensibilities. Following his sold out Union Chapel shows this year, he returns in April 2024 with his trio featuring Jorge Roader and Dave King for his biggest London show to date.
Listen to Julian Lage's latest single "Omission" which will be featured on his forthcoming Blue Note album to be released in early 2024.
Ludovico Einaudi
Over the years Ludovico Einaudi has quietly become one of the most successful musicians in the world. His hauntingly beautiful and evocative music tops the classical charts worldwide, particularly here in the UK, which this year, saw a run of hugely successful sold out arena dates across the UK with his live band. This year Einaudi also released a new collection of hidden gems with Undiscovered II which explored music from across Einaudi's catalogue including unreleased tracks, live performances and his many collaborative projects.
Bonny Light Horseman
Following their 2022 album release Rolling Golden Holy, Anaïs Mitchell, Josh Kaufman, and Eric D. Johnson of Bonny Light Horseman undertook their UK Tour earlier year, performing two sold out nights at Union Chapel with support from Sam Amidon. Expect lots more to come in 2024.
Cassie Kinoshi
Multi-disciplinary and genre-blending composer, arranger and alto-saxophonist Cassie Kinoshi returns to Barbican with her biggest headline show to date with her ten-piece ensemble seed., award-winning turntablist NikNak and London Contemporary Orchestra revisiting her 2023 piece gratitude alongside the premiere of a brand new composition.
On the occasion of International Women’s Day, this show will celebrate Cassie Kinoshi as a composer and bandleader, showcasing her multifaceted and genre bending work. In line with the ongoing demand of recognising women’s exertion for political, economic and social equity, the new composition to be premiered on this show takes inspiration from women’s role in British music history in the Between the Wars Era. It showcases how conflict shapes new social and artistic movements emerging around them, which is constantly relevant to all times in world’s history.
The new work is commissioned by Serious, with funding from 14-18 Now Foundation and with the support of Imperial War Museum.
Chris Botti
Best-selling American trumpeter Chris Botti is beloved by audiences around the world for his unique ability to seamlessly cross between pop, jazz, and classical music. With more than 4 million albums sold worldwide, Botti has found a form of creative expression that expands beyond genres and borders. This year saw Botti's Blue Note Records debut with the release of Vol. 1. Having successfully crossed over from jazz renown to pop stardom, Botti’s first album in more than a decade finds him crossing back, with a small group project focused on acoustic jazz and classic standards that evokes his enthusiasm for the jazz greats past and present.
Chris Botti will perform at the Barbican in May 2024.
Sam Amidon
American folk legend Sam Amidon is known for his ranging thematic music from interpretations of traditional Irish fiddle pieces to old-time melodies and tales from traditional American folk history. His albums draw on old work songs, ballads, hymns and other sonic artefacts from the past, reimagining them in bold, creative new ways to breathe new life into them and recontextualising them alongside original compositions. This year he brought a special double bill show to Cecil Sharp House with Merope whose Lithuanian folk influences and unique atmospheric aesthetic weaves together elements of electronic, ambient, indie and traditional music.
Expect more to come from Sam Amidon in 2024.
Read, Watch and Listen
EFG London Jazz Festival 2023 Highlights
EFG celebrates 15 years of partnership with the EFG London Jazz Festival
Take Five Edition XVIII: Collaborations from last years Take Five Talent Development Scheme
Irreversible Entanglements artist-curated playlist with Crack Magazine 'Selections'
Sunday Mix: Tina Edwards with Crack Magazine 'Selections'
Take a trip down memory lane with International Anthem's Tracing the Lines which takes a look back at the Chicago x London premiere from last year's EFG London Jazz Festival
Articles
Jazz rulebreaker Hiromi: ‘The piano is a plane that can take me anywhere - Guardian
Chasing Energy: An Interview with James Brandon Lewis - The Quietus
Special thanks to all the Serious team and the friends and freelancers, the writers, composers and musicians, the organisers, venues and festivals and all the partners who have helped us this year.
Wishing everyone happy holidays and looking forward to seeing you next year!
From all the Serious team
