Mariam Rezaei is a multi-award-winning composer and turntablist whose practice moves between experimental composition, improvisation, and codes of club culture. Described by The Wire as “one of the most technically adept and creatively daring artists to use the turntable as a musical instrument,” she works with a digital vinyl system that allows her to manipulate samples in real time. Her work pushes the turntable beyond its conventional function, drawing on diasporic musical histories, contemporary composition, and experimental sound practices.

For this residency, Rezaei is joined by collaborator Edward George, a British writer, broadcaster, filmmaker, and founding member of the Black Audio Film Collective. Together, they use the studio as a space for recording and sampling, developing new material centred on the life and work of late avant-garde pianist Cecil Taylor.

Classically trained yet radically uncompromising, Cecil Taylor is widely regarded as one of the pioneers of free jazz. His explosive approach to the piano, described by Val Wilmer as “eighty-eight tuned drums,” resonates with Rezaei’s own reimagining of the turntable as an instrument of physicality and resistance. Through this collaboration, the red thread of The Third Room is extended: a continued exploration of how practices rooted in established traditions can be pushed beyond their limits, opening space for new forms of listening.

mariamrezaei.co.uk