I am an improviser, composer, songwriter, collaborater and community musician. I play voice, guitar, percussion, live sampling, electronics and the contents of my recycling box. I've worked in live art, film, dance and theatre and guitar and   performed improvised and African musics, pop and torch songs alongside and supporting the likes of Ali Farka Toure, Steve Lacy, Bhundhu Boys and Andy Sheppard.   My work has been supported by   Arts Council of England, Performing Rights Society Foundation and featured on radio and TV.   I have a trumpet. It is blue but I do not blow it (much).

As a community musician my rhythm, voicework and training methods, used in education, health, special needs and other settings, led to my being asked to contribute to the innovative Community Music: A Handbook (RHP 2005). I was More Music's Research Fellow in 04/05 which led to Playing The Voice   a methodology for teaching improvisation using voice that can also be used as a tool for personal development.

My explorations of environmental music were recognised in a Year of the Artist award   to Living Room ,   a duo with guitarist James Wood, which performs instant song in people's living rooms. I have played The   Lowry building in Salford and a beck in Grizedale to equal acclaim.

http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/~offbeat/LivingRoom.htm

My irregular solo work ranges from straight singer-songwriter with voice and guitar through to a sort of live ambient sound-painting approach I call maural music.   The One , which used torch song and Sufi poetry to explore the links between   romantic and spiritual love, with voice, live sampling, bric-a-brac and electronic percussion, toured nationally. It   developed into Top Ten Sex Tips , commissioned by Manchester Jazz Festival in 2005 and featuring the original Deep Cabaret   and began my ongoing collaboration with digital video commentary by Jenny McCabe.  

Deep Cabaret Vox   is a project for improvising voices.   Cante Jondo: An Improvatorio came from the idea of improvising an opera. It has little to do with opera as such but brings together singers from very different backgrounds to make an improvised vocal piece using 'spritual' texts. Hearing Voices and Flocking are further developments of the Improvatorio idea.

Hymas & Lewis is an ongoing collaboration with poet and live literature performer Sarah Hymas . We play with ways of combining sound and words.

I am also a UKCP Registered Psychotherapist and Relate Certified Counsellor with 15 years experience of working with individuals, couples and groups in private, NHS and educational settings.