Gallio (CH) / Durrant (UK) - Holowell / Herbert / Denley

Name: Gallio (CH) / Durrant (UK) - Holowell / Herbert / Denley
Start: 2026-01-28T21:30:00+11:00
End: 2026-01-29T00:30:00+11:00
Location: 21 Shepherd St, Marrickville NSW 2204, Australia

Schedule

Wed, 28 Jan, 2026 at 09:30 pm to Thu, 29 Jan, 2026 at 12:30 am

UTC+11:00

Location

21 Shepherd St, Marrickville NSW 2204, Australia | Marrickville, NS

At The Living Room Theatre. Accessible. Kids welcome.
$25 and $15 Conc.
Durrant/Gallio Duo
The duo of Phil Durrant - electric mandolin & electronics, and Christoph Gallio - saxophones, was formed in 2022 during Gallio’s residency in London. However the musicians first met in Switzerland 40 years previously and have occasionally worked together in adhoc projects. They are veterans of the international ‘free improvised music’ scene and have been involved in notable projects that have shaped the development of the music. As a duo, they have a forthcoming release on Empty Birdcage Records.
Phil Durrant
Born near London in 1957, Phil Durrant Durrant is a multi-instrumentalist improviser/composer/sound artist who currently performs solo and group concerts. As a violinist (and member of the Butcher/Russell/Durrant trio, News From The Shed and the Chris Burn Ensemble), he was one of the key exponents of the ‘group voice approach’ style of improvised music. In the late 90s, his influential trio with Radu Malfatti and Thomas Lehn represented a shift to a more ‘reductionist’ approach. The above groups performed at concerts and fest-ivals all over Europe and Canada and released cds and records on Acta and Emanem Records. In recent years, as an acoustic or electric mandolinist, he has been performing duos with guitarists Daniel Thompson and Martin Vishnick as well as saxophonist Christoph Gallio. He also performs regularly in a trio with Mark Wastell and John Butcher and has many ongoing projects with drummer Emil Karlsen including a trio with Maggie Nicols. As a semi-modular synthesist, Phil Durrant continues to perform with Bertrand Denzler and Burkhard Beins in Trio Sowari. The group celebrated their 20th anniversary in 2024. He is also a member of the international electronic ensemble MIMEO with Keith Rowe, Kaffe Matthews, Thomas Lehn, Rafael Toral a.o. With Mark Wastell, Steve Beresford and David Toop.
tps://www.facebook.com/philsowaridurrant/ https://www.facebook.com/sowarimodular/
Christoph Gallio
The Swiss saxophonist and composer Christoph Gallio, who lives in Baden near Zurich, was born in 1957. He studied classical saxophone with Iwan Roth at the Basel Music Conservatory and music with Steve Lacy in Paris. Later he completed a Master of Arts in Transdisciplinarity at the University of the Arts in Zurich (ZHdK). He is the leader of the trio DAY & TAXI for 35 years, currently with Silvan Jeger on bass and Gerry Hemingway on drums. In duo he plays with Markus Eichenberger, Roger Turner, Phil Durrant and Alistair Zaluda.
The trio of Sonya Holowell, Mel Herbert, and Jim Denley is a new grouping of three of Sydney's most experienced improvising musikin.
Sonya Holowell is a Dharawal vocalist, composer and writer. For over a decade Sonya’s expansive vocal practice has woven avant-garde world premieres with electro-acoustic experiments with medieval chant and spontaneous long-form composition. She explores the plural self in its network of relations, directed toward truth and emancipation. She enjoys bringing this mantle to collaboration with others, as artist and consultant. Sonya performs regularly with modular synthesist Ben Carey in their duo Sumn Conduit, and is a PhD candidate in Indigenous Artistic Research.
Melanie Herbert’s multi-speaker installations and compositions have been presented at MONA FOMA, Vivid Festival, ABC Radio and Liquid Architecture. As a violinist, Melanie has performed in The Splinter Orchestra since 2011, and within smaller groups such as Tone Bird with Romy Caen. Melanie also creates sound for theatre, having worked with Green Door Theatre Company, Ninefold Ensemble, Outhouse Theatre Company, and Penrith Performing & Visual Arts. Melanie was sound designer for the last two Originate productions at Q Theatre in 2022 and 2023.
Jim Denley was born in Bulli on Dharawal country. His work emphasizes eco-musicality, spontaneity, site-specificity and co-creation with musickin (human and more-than-human). His As Weather project Volume 1-3 (splitrec) was part of PhD research he undertook at the dept. of Art, Design and Architecture at UNSW. His thesis for this is becoming the book "Towards ecological musicking: 'As Weather' improvisation" (Bloomsbury).