The Hideout Club
1354 W. Wabansia Avenue
Ukranian Village
Chicago, IL 60642
Start time tbc
Entry tbc

Steve Tromans - piano
Miles Levin - drumkit
Chris Mapp - double bass

Kick-starting Tromans' Birmingham-Chicago ensemble project, this first night's performance will take place in the fantastic atmosphere at the Ukranian Village's Hideout Club, Chicago. The trio will perform a series of newly-composed pieces by Tromans, commissioned for the project by Jazzlines.

Elastic Arts
2830 N. Milwaukee Ave
2nd Floor
Chicago, IL 60618
Start time tbc
Entry tbc

Steve Tromans - piano
Miles Levin - drumkit
Chris Mapp - double bass
Mark Sanders - drumkit
Dave Rempis - tenor saxophone
James Falzone - clarinet
Josh Berman - cornet

The Birmingham-Chicago septet of improvisers will be performing a specially-composed piece by Tromans, "Elasticity". The piece, and the evening, is designed to maximise the potential music-making configurations of the seven players, with the piece being structured in several interlinking parts, specifying instrumental combinations rather than WAM notations. Elastic Arts is a music and art gallery space that hosts concerts as part of Chicago's thriving avantgarde jazz/improv scene.

The Hungry Brain
2319 W Belmont Avenue
Chicago, IL 60618
Start time tbc
Entry tbc

Steve Tromans - piano
Miles Levin - drumkit
Chris Mapp - double bass
Mark Sanders - drumkit
Ken Vandermark - tenor & baritone saxophones & clarinet
Dave Rempis - tenor saxophone
James Falzone - clarinet
Josh Berman - cornet

The Birmingham-Chicago project culminates in an evening of new music composed by Tromans, and commissioned by Jazzlines. Following two days of intensive rehearsals, Tromans will be premiering pieces written for the full octet, as well as pieces for smaller groups taken from that pool of eight players. The Hungry Brain is one of the key venues on Chicago's avantgarde music scene and will be a suitably hip place to bring this first stage of the ongoing Birmingham-Chicago project to a close.

Jazzlines Presents...
The Jamhouse
St Paul's Square
Birmingham
B3 1QU
Start time 8.30pm
Free Entry

Tom Hill - double bass
Ian Ellis - tenor sax
Miles Levin - drums
Steve Tromans - piano

Double-bassist Tom Hill returns to the Jamhouse with a line-up not heard together since the days of the Fiddle & Bone in the 1990s. Tromans rejoins the Outsville Quartet for an evening of jazz standards given the special Outsville treatment, in fine company with saxophonist, Ellis, and the drumming sensation that is Miles Levin.

Free Jazz
A Jazzlines Promotion
Symphony Hall
Birmingham
Start time 5pm
Free Entry

Chris Bowden - alto sax
Ben Markland - double bass
Neil Bullock - drums
Steve Tromans - piano

Chris Bowden et al perform the classic American Songbook repertoire at Birmingham Symphony Hall's ever-popular early-evening jazz sessions. Expect alto-saxophone wizardry from Bowden, plus fiery support from Tromans, Markland and Bullock.

Sid Peacock - vocals and guitar
Ruth Angell - vocals and violin
Steve Tromans - keyboard

Peacock and Angell will be performing material from their recent album, "Love Forgiven" in the Hexagon Theatre at the Midlands Arts Centre, Birmingham. They will be joined by Tromans on several of the songs from that latest release. Expect heart-rendering lyricism, balladeering with original and traditional folk songs delivered with a directness and succinctness that is indicative of a deep sense of musicality.

Leeds International Jazz Education Conference
Leeds College of Music
3 Quarry Hill
Leeds
LS2 7PD
Start time 3pm
Entry tbc

In this conference presentation (including recorded and live performance), Tromans will discuss his recent Birmingham-Chicago ensemble project. The talk will focus on the problem of composing notated parts for use by free-improvising musicians - musicians who, by definition, have no immediate requirement to utilise such written materials. The talk will interweave audio recorded in Chicago, plus live solo piano performance with new notated compositions that Tromans has begun to develop following the Chicago visit and research undertaking.

Ray Butcher - trumpet
Miles Levin - drums
Steve Tromans - piano
Simon Smith aka "Smudge" - double bass

Down on the upstroke, with an Atlantic wind for support, Butcher et al perform from the standard repertoire in jazz at the furthermost jazz club in South-East England.

Ray Butcher - trumpet
Miles Levin - drums
Steve Tromans - piano
Simon Smith aka "Smudge" - double bass

Fresh from their Cornish exploits, Butcher's quartet perform at the Yardbird's regular weekly jazz session. The gig will be followed, as usual, by a late-night jam session.

Performance Studies Network Second International Conference
AHRC Research Centre for Musical Performance as Creative Practice (CMPCP)
Faculty of Music
University of Cambridge
11 West Road
Cambridge
CB3 9DP
Start time 3pm
Entry tbc

In this conference presentation (and live performance), Tromans will introduce a philosophical notion of the affective, drawing on the work of Gilles Deleuze and Brian Massumi, with a view to modelling the creative, relational practice of expert improvisers in events of performance, and the potential of certain notated parts to enter into that affective relationship. Tromans will argue that by introducing the affective into our understanding of the complex workings of events of music-making in performance, a certain adequacy is introduced into the manner in which we model music-making - and, as a result, the boundaries between what we typically consider to be the separate (and separable) categories of composition, improvisation, and performance are problematised.

Free Jazz
A Jazzlines Promotion
Symphony Hall
Birmingham
Start time 5pm
Free Entry

Lydia Glanville - drums
Steve Tromans - piano
Trevor Lines - double bass
one other player tbc

Formed in late-2012, this new band performs original compositions by band-members, focused on intra-group interaction and deep listening. Not one to miss!

What is Performance Philosophy?: Staging a new field
University of Surrey
Guildford
Start time 11.45am
Entry tbc

This presentation is concerned with the notion of a philosophical dimension to creative practice in music-making. Specifically, it is focused on an aspect of my recent doctoral enquiry: the investigation, in and through performance practice, of complex temporal process. The presentation will feature audio recordings of some of the doctoral research undertaken in the medium of jazz performance.

SMA Theory and Analysis Conference
Keele University
Music Department
Keele
Staffordshire
ST5 5BG
Start time tbc
Entry tbc

This presentation is concerned with the question of transferability, in terms of the dissemination of the outcomes of practice-as-research in the wider music-research community, and also with regard to the project-to-project trajectories of such research undertakings. Drawing on the practice theorist, Bourdieu, I will argue that there is an ineffability inherent in all art practice that is resistant to discursivisation, where that ineffable quality, in the words of Bourdieu, “communicates ... on the hither side of words or concepts”.

Birmingham Jazz
The Barton Arms
144 High St
Aston
Birmingham
B6 4UP
Start time 7.45pm
Entry £10/£8

Chris Bowden - alto sax
Ben Markland - double bass
Neil Bullock - drums
Steve Tromans - piano
Percy Pursglove - trumpet
Bryan Corbett - trumpet

From the promoter's website: "A unique Birmingham Jazz project intended to the best of locally-based musicians to Birmingham Jazz audiences, in a first class jazz club setting. This is in indeed a super-group worthy of a much higher profile on both the regional and national scene. None of these excellent artists need an introduction to jazz lovers, let’s just say it promises to be an unforgettable night of first class contemporary jazz."

Jazz Shark
The Cross
145 Alcester Road
Moseley
Birmingham
B12 9AH
Start time 8pm
Free entry

Steve Tromans - keyb
Tom Ford - guitar
Ash Trigg - bass
Tymek Joswiak - drums
Ben Kane - vocals, electronics, percussion

Second outing for Tromans' suite of pieces in tribute to the late Robert Anton Wilson. Expect the unexpected.

Blam Birmingham
Ort Artist and Community Cafe
Balsall Heath
Birmingham
B12 9AH
Start time 9pm
Entry £3

Steve Tromans - piano
... plus special guests to be announced on the night

Following the recording of his fourth solo album in a decade, Tromans launches the new release at Birmingham's Ort Cafe. Expect performances of material from the new album, plus special guest appearances to be announced on the night, or nearer the date... Watch this space and don't miss the gig if you want to get the chance to own your own copy of Tromans' latest music-making endeavours...

Jazz at Churchill's
A Sam Marchant Beat City Jazz Promotion
Churchill's Snooker Club
Stevenson's Place
Birmingham
Start time 9pm
Entry tbc

Steve Tromans - piano
Sid Peacock - narration and vocals
Mark Hanslip
Miles Levin - drums
Mike Green - double bass
Chris Young - tenor saxophone

"Unscrew the locks from the doors! Unscrew the doors themselves from their jambs!"

"I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving, hysterical, naked ..."

"They saw it all! The wild eyes, the holy yells, down to the river and into the street ..."

"Holy the Bop Apocalypse! Holy the Jazz Band Marijuana, Peace Peyote Pipes & Drums!"

In 2003, Tromans was commissioned by the arts organisation, Birmingham Jazz, to write a large-scale work of his own choosing. The resulting work, a musical setting of Allen Ginsberg’s Howl for narrator/vocalist and musicians active on the Birmingham jazz and improvised music scene.

The Howl setting was premiered in 2004 in Birmingham (CBSO Centre), and toured in the UK during the following two years – playing at, among other events, the Glastonbury Festival, the Vortex in London, the StAnza Poetry Festival, St Andrews, Scotland, Between the Lines Literary Festival, Belfast, and the Aldeburgh Poetry Festival. The band also gave a special performance on the 50th anniversary of the first reading by Ginsberg.

This new performance has been arranged in association with promoter and jazz musician, Sam Marchant, and will take place at his regular fortnightly jazz club at Churchill's Snooker Club in the heart of Birmingham's city centre. Tromans is joined by several of the original Howl Band members, plus the young tenor saxophonist, Chris Young, currently making a name for himself and the Birmingham scene, and beyond. Utterly unmissable - utterly unforgettable. Don't miss or forget it!

Birmingham Jazz
The Red Lion
Warstone Lane
Birmingham
B18 6NG
Start time 7.45pm
£3/Members Free

Steve Tromans - piano
Miles Levin - drums
Chris Mapp - double bass

Bound to confound. Tromans, Levin and Mapp have worked together over the last decade in a variety of jazz and improv situations. The last visit to Birmingham Jazz was a resounding success - expect white-hot intensity, deep groove, heartbreaking ballads, and much much more besides...

Blam Birmingham
Ort Artist and COmmunity Cafe
Balsall Heath
Birmingham
B12 9AH
Start time 9pm
Entry £3

Steve Tromans - keyb
Tom Ford - guitar
Ash Trigg - bass
Tymek Joswiak - drums
Ben Kane - vocals, electronics, percussion

Third outing for Tromans' suite of pieces in tribute to the late Robert Anton Wilson. Expect the unexpected.

Music and/as Process Symposium
Huddersfield University
Queensgate
Huddersfield
West Yorkshire
HD1 3DH
Start time 11.45am
Entry tbc

This paper combines spoken and written text with audio documentation. It is concerned with my recent doctoral undertaking in practice-as-research, investigating temporal experience through music-making in events of performance. Specifically, it is focused on a complex notion of time, as articulated in music practice in live performance, and as experienced by listeners and performers, simultaneously, though internally-differentiated in nature.

Free Jazz
A Jazzlines Promotion
Symphony Hall
Birmingham
Start time 5pm
Free Entry

Alison Symons - vocals
Steve Tromans - piano
Matt Findley - double bass
Euan Palmer - drums

Symons' classic, soulful jazz voice, with support from Tromans on piano, and two of the young lions of the Birmingham contemporary jazz scene, Findley and Palmer. Arrangements by Symons, plus renditions of the standard repertoire at this ever-popular early-evening jazz session at Birmingham's Symphony Hall.

Elgar School of Music
16-20 Deansway
Worcester
WR1 2ES
Start times tbc
Entry tbc

Steve Tromans - piano

Details to follow in due course...

Free Jazz
A Jazzlines Promotion
Brindley Place
Birmingham
Start time 5pm
Free Entry

Lydia Glanville - drums
Steve Tromans - piano
Trevor Lines - double bass
one other player tbc

Formed in late-2012, this new band performs original compositions by band-members, focused on intra-group interaction and deep listening. Not one to miss!