With just under two months to go until Le Guess Who? extravaganza kicks off in Utrecht, today the organisers revealed the full line-up. A cluster of new announcements, including Ami Dang, HHY & The Macumbas, Xylouris White, Group Listening, Bremer/McCoy, Mythic Sunship and Ed Dowie join a star studded line-up, co-curated by Fatoumata Diawara, Jenny Hval, Patrick Higgins, The Bug, Moon Duo, and Iris van Herpen & Salvador Breed.
After enticing us with its curators and artist announcements over the last few months, with a lot of bands that we absolutely love, Le Guess Who? has now revealed the full line-up for its 13th edition running from November 7-10 in various venues across Utrecht.
Avant-garde composer, guitarist, and producer Patrick Higgins had already unveiled his sublime curatorial bill including Dossier X, his own immersive audio-visual collaboration with installation artist Matthew Schreiber and choreographer Monica Mirabile, as well as the likes of Tyondai Braxton, Conrad Tao, Leila Bordreuil, Vicky Chow, Lightning Bolt, Miranda Cuckson and Holly Herndon. Added to Higgins’s curation is an incredibly special performance by AEAEA, his new project with Chilean producer Nicolas Jaar, which will see its premiere at the festival. Through instrumental performance and live digital acrobatics, the pair will resample each other’s instruments live.
Setting the stage for rare performances, Le Guess Who? unveiled a new ambitious program called Hidden Musics, in collaboration with Grammy-award winning music producer, activist and author Ian Brennan, and Ljubljana based American musician, record producer and Glitterbeat Records founder Chris Eckman. Paying special attention to musical traditions from secluded regions of the world, Hidden Musics will include female Greek choir Isokratisses, Pakistan’s 75-year old Surti master Ustad Saami and Mexico’s La Bruja de Texcoco.
Another fresh addition is a special collaboration between guitarist and composer William Tyler and experimental harpist Mary Lattimore.
Also amongst the final wave of names newly added to the general line-up is Baltimore based vocalist, sitarist, producer and composer Ami Dang presenting her recent instrumental album, Parted Plains, inspired by South Asian and Middle Eastern folktales, enigmatic Kiwi singer-songwriter Aldous Harding, following the release of her critically acclaimed third album Designer, Detroit-raised, Brooklyn-based rapper and producer Quelle Chris, Portuguese collective HHY & The Macumbas, known for the tribal and exhilarating energy of their live shows, Danish dub-jazz duo Bremer/McCoy who have a new album releasing next month and Xylouris White, the duo of Cretan lute player George Xylouris and Australian drummer Jim White, who will be gifting the world with their fourth full album, The Sisypheans, on the eve of their performance at the festival.
Other new musical treats across the dozens of stages include Ghanaian hip hop outfit FOKN Bois, lo-fi pop singer songwriter Ed Dowie, the utterly engrossing ambient reworkings of some electronic classics by Stephen Black and Paul Jones who operate as Group Listening, London-based experimental singer-songwriter Koichi Yamanoha aka Grimm Grimm, the solo project of Peter Cat Recording Co frontman Suryakant Sawhney under the guise Lifafa, the dark and ritualistic performances of Russian indie band Shortparis, Danish progressive space rock band Mythic Sunship and experimental producer Alessio Natalizia, aka Not Waving, and alt-rock icon Mark Lanegan who teamed up this year for their collaborative album Downwelling.
With such a wealth of sonic offerings from all over the globe, the stars will align to celebrate the 13th edition of Le Guess Who?. So be sure to look up and consider this a celestial warning to grab yourself a ticket. Daily tickets and 4-Day Festival Passes are now available on leguesswho.com, where you can also find the full line-up in detail and more info.
