The three-day programme features felicita, Laurel Halo with Hanne Lippard, and Mark Fell with Mohammad Reza Mortazavi.
Assembly, the biannual experimental sound and music series at Somerset House Studios, returns to London from 26–28 March with a programme of performances, premieres, installations and talks.
Launched in 2018, the experimental series centres on sonic practices within the multidisciplinary artist community based at Somerset House, also functioning as a testing ground for new work, presenting commissions, premieres and live experiments that sit between exhibition and festival formats.
The opening night on Thursday, 26 March focuses on deep listening. Composer Ellen Arkbro will premiere For Crumhorns and Regal, a work created during her 2025 residency at Somerset House Studios, which will be performed by the London Crumhorn Consort with Arkbro accompanying on reed organ.
Artist and composer Raheel Khan will also present a new performance, Oh Forewarn – a score built around sustained brass tones and analogue synthesis, drawing on the historic use of horns as signalling devices.
An installation by musician Laurel Halo and artist Hanne Lippard will open the same evening in the Studios’ gallery space G31. Titled Sour Loop, the collaborative work combines musical composition and spoken language to explore how sound operates in public environments, drawing on references such as PA announcements, muzak and anti-loitering deterrent systems. The exhibition runs until 12 April.
On Friday, 27 March, Assembly presents two performance works shaped through improvisation and live sound processes. Somerset House Studios resident, PC Music’s felicita, will present czysta forma, an evolving live performance project inspired by the concept of “pure form” developed by Polish playwright and artist Witkacy. The work expands an electronic score into a live instrumental performance by a chamber ensemble.
The same evening will include Relay, a performance by Hannan Jones and Samir Kennedy that combines movement, looping tape systems and live sound capture.
Saturday, 28 March features eight performances alongside a programme of talks and lectures. The live programme begins with (un-)drowned by Seyi Adelekun, which blends experimental vocals, water percussion, movement and hydrophone recordings.
Later performances include Working Memory by interdisciplinary media artist Daniel Oduntan with the Audio Visual Ensemble, exploring how memory and place shift through regeneration and media circulation.
The afternoon will also feature new ensemble works by Turner Prize-winning artist Jasleen Kaur and artist-filmmaker Onyeka Igwe. Kaur’s Supra, developed during a year-long residency at Somerset House Studios, brings together an intergenerational group of musicians performing vocals, trumpet and dilruba. Igwe will present a live choral performance connected to their film installation, No archive can restore this chorus of (diasporic) shame.
Evening performances include a collaboration between composer Mark Fell and Iranian percussionist Mohammad Reza Mortazavi, as well as a new work by Hanne Lippard and Renato Grieco exploring voice through layered speech, music and viola da gamba.
The programme closes with performances by DeForrest Brown, Jr and Trevor Mathison. Brown will present a live iteration of Synoptic Audio, a multimedia project examining rhythm, spatial sound and the circulation of music. Mathison, a founding member of the Black Audio Film Collective, will present a new improvisational performance combining electronics, field recordings and environmental sound.
Tickets are available via Somerset House Studios now.
