A Short Bio:
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Ever since joining Henry Cow in January 1974, Lindsay Cooper established herself as one of
the leading creative forces on the European new music scene. She also
kept close ties with the Canterbury scene, collaborating with Hatfield
and the North, Egg, National Health, Steve Hillage and many others, including
many projects with her ex-Henry Cow colleagues.
Lindsay Cooper was born in Hornsey, North of London, in 1951. At
age 11 she started taking piano lessons, but after a couple
of years she became fascinated by the bassoon, the
instrument played by her teacher's son who was a member of
the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra. From then on, she
concentrated on the bassoon and studied classical music.
From 1966 to 1968, she was a member of the National Youth
Orchestra of Great Britain, before entering the Royal
Academy of Music in London, subsequent moving to New York to
study there for one year. In the meantime, she had started
taking part in various recording projects, in the fields of
film soundtracks and classical music.
At the age of 20, Cooper decided to leave
the classical world altogether and joined a progressive rock
band, Comus, where she stayed for one year, until August
1972. During her brief spell with that group, she learned to
play the oboe and flute, although she never really liked the
latter instrument. In 1973, she was involved in a project
with the Ritual Theatre and through this came into contact
with the musicians from Henry Cow. When Geoff Leigh left
Henry Cow, Cooper replaced him.
Her stint with Henry Cow was however very
short, and she left in August 1974 after recording
Unrest
with them. Before long, she was to rejoin, remaining
involved in the band's recording projects, notably both
albums done with Slapp Happy. During that period, she played
on Steve Hillage's Fish
Rising, Comus' To Keep From Crying,
Egg's Civil
Surface and Hatfield and the
North's The Rotters'
Club, was in the theatre band for "The City", a rock musical for which she was also the
musical director, and started playing jazz with Lol Coxhill,
Derek Bailey and Evan Parker. Eventually, she rejoined Henry
Cow.
Late in 1977, Lindsay Cooper formed
the Feminist Improvising Group, a loosely-structured,
all-female band which also featured Maggie Nichols, Georgie
Born (who had replaced John Greaves in Henry Cow), Irene
Schweitzer and Sally Potter. This coincided with her
starting playing soprano saxophone.
Henry Cow's final effort, Western Culture (1978)
featured a whole side of Cooper's compositions.
The reason for that was that the band had split, from a
creative point of view, between Cooper and Tim
Hodgkinson's instrumental material, and Fred Frith and Chris
Cutler's songs which ended up as the first Art Bears album.
After the break-up of Henry Cow in September 1978,
Cooper
briefly joined National Health (along with Georgie Born),
then led by her long-time friend Dave Stewart, but left when
the latter called it a day and joined Bill Bruford's
band.
From 1977 to 1982, Cooper was a member of
the Feminist Improvising Group, alongside the likes of
Georgie Born, Maggie Nicols, and Irene Schweitzer. In the
early 80s, she kept busy on the live front as member of the
Mike Westbrook Orchestra and ex-Pere Ubu David Thomas' group
The Pedestrians. From 1982 she led her own group, the
Lindsay Cooper Film Music
Orchestra. She wrote many scores
for films and TV, including The
Gold Diggers (1983), directed by
Sally Potter, and also several compositions for dance and
theatre including Face
On (1983), a dance show by Maedee
Dupres.
Of particular note in her work in this
period was News From Babel, a band project with Cutler,
harpist Zeena Parkins and former Henry Cow vocalist Dagmar
Krause. On the band's two albums, Cooper wrote the music,
and Chris the words. The group's two albums, Work Resumed On The Tower (1984) and Letters
Home (1986), was in the vein of
Henry Cow's best work of the mid-seventies.
Her song cycle Oh Moscow was performed
live around the world from 1987 by a band featuring Sally
Potter, Phil Minton, Hugh Hopper and various drummers among
whom Marilyn Mazur, Chris Cutler and Charles Hayward; it was
recorded live at the 1989 Victoriaville festival in Canada.
In 1991, an album of her contemporary dance pieces,
Schroedinger's
Cat, was released. In 1992, she
premiered her Concerto for sopranino saxophone and strings
in London, and her Songs For
Bassoon and Orchestra was
performed in Bologna.
Sadly, by the late 1990s, and until her death in 2013, Cooper retired from performing and, ultimately, from composing as well, when the severity of her multiple sclerosis (first diagnosed twenty years prior) gradually reduced her physical ability. Even communication with the outside world eventually became nearly impossible.
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