[Text available only in English] I am a performance artist working in the fields of music, physicality, installation and multi media. I have been an artist for over 20 years, initially trained in traditional Kathak dance and Bengali folk music, later to become an mc and performance artist.
Born in London, I was then raised in Bangladesh and returned to the UK at the age of 6. At 18 I studied Ancient History, Classical Civilisation, completing my BA...[Text available only in English] I am a performance artist working in the fields of music, physicality, installation and multi media. I have been an artist for over 20 years, initially trained in traditional Kathak dance and Bengali folk music, later to become an mc and performance artist.
Born in London, I was then raised in Bangladesh and returned to the UK at the age of 6. At 18 I studied Ancient History, Classical Civilisation, completing my BA at the University of Manchester, followed by an MA in Combined Ancient and Modern History. I received distinctions in Ancient Literature Comparative Studies, Modern Art, and Social Relations. Working in media and music promotions for the next 4 years, I began producing works in the studio to record albums and performing live installation pieces. I completed residencies at Manchester venues The green room and Contact Theatre as well as residencies and producing roles of music and multi media work in the city. I have produced more than 10 solo works, with numerous performances in the UK in small spaces through to large scale spaces.
I have performed nationally and internationally with shows to include Samson and Delilah with Jose Carerras, Royal Opera House (London), Women Music Makers (Denmark) Bangladesh National Independence Day at Royal House (Belgium), Images of Tour (Denmark, Arhus, Odense, Copenhagen), Sydney Festival (Sydney), Whispering Through Windows, Public Transit Recordings with Inside A Mind (Toronto). UK festivals have included BBC Mela, Brighton Fringe, Lyrix Organix - Medicines Sans Frontiers. My work has been played on radios worldwide and include BBC Asian Network, BBC 1XTRA.
Closer has had some live performances over the last 6 months, presented in a development context. My work is organic and collaborative, with a real focus on technique and expression in totality. I seldom work on the isolated aspect of any given theme or idea, as I believe the richest way to create something honest and meaningful is to feel and engage, to commit to the aspiration. My work is layered and textured, sound is produced, is made with thoughts and levels, layering again and again, working, reworking, playing with the organic versus the technological, gaining insights and then throwing them back into the pool of the concept, to see what re emerges.
The drone, the violin and my technological music making tools are my staple performance. The technology works when I accept that I have entered the machine, then I know I am no longer with the acoustics of say a forest. The sound bounces off the space in different ways. And so I enter another realm, and then the sound of an arabic scale played on my german made western violin, or the mesmerising sound of the drone (tanpura), or the beats and rhythmns of a snare all through say, a loop pedal, or a delay modeler, again adds new rituals, new levels and layers, the reverberations of which are given as a gift to the audience. There is of course a disturbing nature to this play on the natural and the physical world (the premise here being that the natural world has a physicality, but is still referred to as a completely separate state of being to the physical), but the aesthetics and apsirations of the ideals always strive to be poetic and attain to beauty.It is the artist I am.
The space defines so much of the performance and the work, as it is a conversation with the sound, reverberations, acoustics and the makeup of the environment. The smaller sounds which are not usually heard, are found in the space, and amplified. Distortion is used, but only with a finely tuned ear, so that the listener can really hear. Based on martial art philiosophy of the power of audio capabilities as a combat martial technique, I have engaged in blindfolding training in addition to Indian classical vocal and musical techniques as a way to develop my AV work, and increase the experience for the viewer and listener.
Sarah Sayeed
Born in London, I was then raised in Bangladesh and returned to the UK at the age of 6. At 18 I studied Ancient History, Classical Civilisation, completing my BA...[Text available only in English] I am a performance artist working in the fields of music, physicality, installation and multi media. I have been an artist for over 20 years, initially trained in traditional Kathak dance and Bengali folk music, later to become an mc and performance artist.
Born in London, I was then raised in Bangladesh and returned to the UK at the age of 6. At 18 I studied Ancient History, Classical Civilisation, completing my BA at the University of Manchester, followed by an MA in Combined Ancient and Modern History. I received distinctions in Ancient Literature Comparative Studies, Modern Art, and Social Relations. Working in media and music promotions for the next 4 years, I began producing works in the studio to record albums and performing live installation pieces. I completed residencies at Manchester venues The green room and Contact Theatre as well as residencies and producing roles of music and multi media work in the city. I have produced more than 10 solo works, with numerous performances in the UK in small spaces through to large scale spaces.
I have performed nationally and internationally with shows to include Samson and Delilah with Jose Carerras, Royal Opera House (London), Women Music Makers (Denmark) Bangladesh National Independence Day at Royal House (Belgium), Images of Tour (Denmark, Arhus, Odense, Copenhagen), Sydney Festival (Sydney), Whispering Through Windows, Public Transit Recordings with Inside A Mind (Toronto). UK festivals have included BBC Mela, Brighton Fringe, Lyrix Organix - Medicines Sans Frontiers. My work has been played on radios worldwide and include BBC Asian Network, BBC 1XTRA.
Closer has had some live performances over the last 6 months, presented in a development context. My work is organic and collaborative, with a real focus on technique and expression in totality. I seldom work on the isolated aspect of any given theme or idea, as I believe the richest way to create something honest and meaningful is to feel and engage, to commit to the aspiration. My work is layered and textured, sound is produced, is made with thoughts and levels, layering again and again, working, reworking, playing with the organic versus the technological, gaining insights and then throwing them back into the pool of the concept, to see what re emerges.
The drone, the violin and my technological music making tools are my staple performance. The technology works when I accept that I have entered the machine, then I know I am no longer with the acoustics of say a forest. The sound bounces off the space in different ways. And so I enter another realm, and then the sound of an arabic scale played on my german made western violin, or the mesmerising sound of the drone (tanpura), or the beats and rhythmns of a snare all through say, a loop pedal, or a delay modeler, again adds new rituals, new levels and layers, the reverberations of which are given as a gift to the audience. There is of course a disturbing nature to this play on the natural and the physical world (the premise here being that the natural world has a physicality, but is still referred to as a completely separate state of being to the physical), but the aesthetics and apsirations of the ideals always strive to be poetic and attain to beauty.It is the artist I am.
The space defines so much of the performance and the work, as it is a conversation with the sound, reverberations, acoustics and the makeup of the environment. The smaller sounds which are not usually heard, are found in the space, and amplified. Distortion is used, but only with a finely tuned ear, so that the listener can really hear. Based on martial art philiosophy of the power of audio capabilities as a combat martial technique, I have engaged in blindfolding training in addition to Indian classical vocal and musical techniques as a way to develop my AV work, and increase the experience for the viewer and listener.
Sarah Sayeed
Performances (1)
Videos (2)
