Image: Photo of Bishi

'Imogen' may have been blowing up a storm just the other week, but up in the North of London new Stoke Newington venue The Old Church is about to give her a run for her money. ‘BREATHE: A celebration of air’ is a three week festival of music, performance and contemporary art curated around an element that’s essential to us all.

“BREATHE is about celebrating the profound connection we all share through our breath, the air,” Old Church Director Rachel Millward says, going on to explain why it’s such a fitting inspiration for a venue that has ‘inspiring arts, inspiring community’ as its mantra. “We are trying to be open and inclusive of the wide diversity of local communities and possible audiences and participators. As Director of The Old Church I'm thinking about that before anything else,” she says. “It's been wonderful to programme events which include young disabled people, older adults, those who love to sing, East African artists, members of the Alevi community, teenagers, parents and babies. And "inspiration" literally means "breathing in" - so you couldn't have a better fit for our mission.”

Inspired by Output Arts’ VOX: a multi-sensory wind harp installation located in St Mary’s church, the programme is a mixture of newly commissioned artworks and community facing workshops like TILT - a sea of hand-made windmills that will fill the churchyard throughout the festival. “We've been making these windmills at free workshops in nearby schools, a Turkish / Kurdish community centre, a care home, dementia groups, a hospice, youth groups and a refugee & migrant centre,” Millward says. “Everyone involved in making windmills will be the first to experience TILT, and the wind harp installation, at a special community preview. This has been a wonderful way to open conversations with different community groups - a great start to our journey of connection!”

Other highlights include inter-disciplinary artist Ansuman Biswas who is creating a unique singing and live art experience called KITE, involving people from all over the community singing together for 24 hours (as a drop-in). This is a great “opportunity for diverse local faith groups - including the Turkish / Kurdish Alevi community, the liberal Christian and Jewish communities and more, to gather together and create a reflective event of music, song and dance in response to the wind harp,” Millward explains.

BREATHE is also a great chance to see cutting edge artists creating bespoke commissions around air. The line up is impressive including Bishi, Candoco Dance Company, John Hegley and Scottish folk artist Karine Polwart who will perform a thought-provoking 50-minute vocal piece inspired by flight science, Celtic and Nordic weather myths and ancient bird lore.

Looking over the programme BREATHE promises to be a stormer. So why not take a moment to catch your breath and join us as we sit down with Millward to find out more.

Honour Bayes: The tag line for The Old Church is ‘inspiring arts, inspiring community’. How do you go about reaching that community and discovering what will inspire them?

Rachel Millward: Great question! The Old Church is an ancient, sacred space. People have been coming here for over 1000 years, to seek inspiration and community. We want to revitalise the building for contemporary society, and make it a place where people gather together to seek inspiration not only from outstanding artists, but also from each other. There are lots of different communities in Hackney, and we're great at eating each other's food, but not so used to hearing each other's stories. We hope to become a place where creativity brings us together across differences of age, culture or ability. But delivering that mission takes a lot of hard work and - crucially - resources. By which we mean funding!

Honour: How did you come up with the concept for BREATHE and what was the process of programming it?

Rachel: Output Arts told me about their wind harp over a year ago. They were interested in installing it in the church tower. I immediately loved the idea. The Old Church has a beautiful, resonant, acoustic - I loved the idea of opening the space with a sound installation. We had some early brainstorms in the pub about artists and events that might work in conjunction with the wind harp. I thought about what programming strands would tap into different local audiences, how we could work across artistic disciplines, and how we could get the community involved as participants as well as audiences. I spoke with several artists (Bishi and Ansuman were the first I approached) and organisations (Candoco Dance Company, Numbi Arts) who were immediately enthused by the concept, then put together the bids for the Arts Council and Near Neighbours. Once I knew we had the funding, I went further afield as I discovered that award winning Scottish folk artist Karine Polwart had a specific passion for the theme, whilst at the same time we began connecting with the community organisations who have contributed to TILT.

Honour: Which pieces in the festival are you particularly excited by and why?

Rachel: The festival centres around VOX - a wind harp installation by Output Arts. Wind harps, also called Aeolian harps after the Greek god of wind, have been around for thousands of years. I find it exciting to be working within an ancient tradition in that way, but Output have radically reinvented it - this harp, already fixed high in the tower of St Mary's church across the road, is a stunning white cube structure. The sound we will hear in The Old Church is tuned so it resonates to give voice to the space itself, rather than responding to the length of the strings. It creates a mesmerising sound, from the beautiful combination of natural stimulus and digital process. It's as modern as it possibly could be - wifi and digital sound processing - and it's ancient - this 450 year old church, the wind... VOX will be experienced before every concert in the programme, for BREATHING SPACE meditation at midday almost daily through the festival, and all day on Saturday Feb 27th.

We have two different shows that are based on a collaboration between VOX - created by the wind, resonating in the building - and the human voice - created by breath, resonating in our bodies. The first is the UK's leading Khoomi / Mongolian throat singers Michael Ormiston and Candida Valentino. We're going to hear some amazing and surprising sounds! So that night will be a stormer.

Bishi is a fascinating artist to work with and an incredible performer. She loves to bring Eastern and Western musical traditions together in a contemporary, electro-pop vibe. I'm not sure that the wind harp has ever jammed with the sitar before?! Her and Neil Kaczor have been busy researching Aeolian harp and romantic poetry, listening to recordings of VOX and devising something entirely new for this show. As ever with Bishi, there's also a strong visual element, this time with Noriko Okaku on visuals. Can't wait.

Sam Lee, Helen Chadwick and Ansuman Biswas are coming together for the first time to perform an evening of songs inspired by the wind. There's something truly magical when such brilliant artists combine their ideas, creativity and talent. I was in the space with two of them the other day, eavesdropping on their conversations and snippets of inspiration. I don't think it'll be your average folk night! They plan to make full use of the church itself as an instrument, and to let their voices resonate as the building allows, whilst bringing together the vast knowledge of songs from different folk traditions that they know between them. I really have no idea what they're going to sing, but I have absolute confidence that it's going to be stunning.

Honour: The programme is a mixture of workshops as well as performances. Are you hoping that both these forms of creativity – created and presented – will inform one another and how can you foresee that happening?

Rachel: Well, KITE is both! Ansuman Biswas is leading three workshops before the 24-hour durational piece. This’ll give people an idea of what it's all about, and to gain some confidence in singing together, playing some games, focusing on breath and voice. But then, the piece itself will be completely unpredictable - improvising as it happens - open to all. Who knows how it will go! It's also possible that some people who have been to the Throat Singing Workshop will come and bring what they've learned there to KITE.

The Storytelling event with SPARK is preceded by a workshop which gives people the tools to tell their own stories more effectively. So that's an obvious one where the creativity of the workshop will be brought into the presentation of the evening (this time open mic).

Output Arts are hoping that more musicians will come and hear VOX on Saturday 27th February, develop ideas and return to perform at their open mic / performance session on Friday 18th March.

Honour: Each community is unique, what are the characteristics of the Stoke Newington community and how is that reflected in the BREATHE programme?

Rachel: Stoke Newington is more diverse than Church Street makes it seem! It's certainly an area with a high density of culture-lovers, and there's plenty within the ticketed programme to appeal to all tastes and age groups. I guess our stereotype is all about buggies and organic (soya) lattes. We catered for parents with Tots Tunes: Tea + a gig & a John Hegley workshop on poetry, drawing breath and dragons (!), and for those focused on well-being, we have plenty of yoga, almost daily BREATHING SPACE (meditation at midday) and the UK's best (non)-Mongolian throat singers performing with mind-blowing voices, wind harp and gongs on Saturday March 27th.

But scratch the surface and you'll find much greater cultural diversity in the area. East African collective Numbi Arts are running a brilliant day of yoga, instrument making, drumming and dancing for all on March 13th. Ansuman and Bishi both bring something of their Indian heritage to their contributions. By far the largest cultural group in Stoke Newington are the Turkish / Kurdish community who have already been making windmills at the DayMer Centre, and will be very involved in the inter-faith programme through the (very musical) Alevi community.

And of course diversity isn't just about cultural difference. Older adults at the hospice and a local care home, plus early onset Dementia groups at Family Mosaic are also part of TILT. Young disabled and non disabled dancers will work with the general public at Candoco Dance Company's Day of Dance.

Honour: As you know community engagement is a long process based on continuing relationships. Do you hope that BREATHE will have an afterlife and how can you envisage this happening?

Rachel: Yes. Festivals are a great burst of energy, ideas and connections, but the real work is what carries on for the rest of the year. It's my hope that BREATHE will radically widen the circles around The Old Church, opening the channels for more longer term programming and involvement, and - here's the crucial bit - taking us a step forward in the funding journey which is, at the end of the day, what will enable us to make our vision a reality. I'm going to be all eyes and ears throughout the festival, seeing what works, seeing which audiences are most enthused, which communities might like to deepen their involvement... BREATHE is just the beginning for us.

BREATHE: A celebration of air
26 February - 20 March 2016
The Old Church
(on the corner of Clissold Park, opposite St Mary's New Church),
Stoke Newington, N16 9ES
theoldchurch.org.uk