Charles Hayward on collaboration & letting the past take care of itself

From This Heat, and Quiet Sun, Hayward moved on to Camberwell Now, via stints recording and performing with The Raincoats and Everything But The Girl, and since the 1980s has been on a meandering solo career that has seen him release 12 albums. He’s also become a keen collaborator as part of projects including Massacre (with Bill Laswell and Fred Frith), Albert Newton (with Pat Thomas and John Edwards) and About Group (with Hot Chip’s Alexis Taylor.

From 2016 to 2019, Hayward reunited with Bullen to present This Is Not This Heat for a series of performances across the UK, Europe, USA and Japan. And in October he joins us as part of our Purcell Sessions series for a collaborative concert with the London Contemporary Orchestra, that promises a heady mix of drums, voice and electronics. Ahead of that we grabbed him for a quick catch up.

Charles, how would you describe your music to someone new to it?

Now music from South East London, but take a listen for yourself

What are your earliest musical memories?

Pots and pans on the kitchen floor with wooden spoons when very young. Playing the piano in a thunderstorm when I was around eight years old. A distant look in my father’s eyes when he played Ella Fitzgerald singing ‘Every Time We Say Goodbye’.

Did you always want to be a professional musician?

Pretty much, as soon as I realised that people went to work and had different jobs I wanted music to be what I did.

What’s been your career highlight to date? Has there been a stand-out moment where you’ve looked around at where you are and what you’re doing and gone ‘wow’?

I try to keep moving and moments like you describe sort of weigh me down, the memories are great, but tomorrow’s even better. Playing as This Is Not This Heat made me realise that stuff we’d made 40 years earlier still spoke to people now and new ears, not a nostalgia trip; that just made me want to keep moving, the past can take care of itself.

‘I just love making music with people’

What led to you working with the London Contemporary Orchestra? And what about this project excites you the most?

Music’s weird, just do your thing and keep your antennae bristling, and things connect because that’s what things do. I’m excited about working with musicians who make music in a very different way from me and finding an open zone where we can make sound together.

What do you look for in a musical collaboration?

Mostly I want a fresh challenge so there’s stuff to learn, and also to work with people who are interested in trying things and have skills and insights of their own to bring and share.

Are there any other collaborations you’ve been part of so far that have been especially important to your musical development?

So many that have helped shape my music, This Heat, Camberwell Now, Massacre with Bill Laswell and Fred Frith, as well as long term improvisation projects with Pat Thomas, John Edwards, Harry Beckett, Lol Coxhill, Hugh Hopper, and Orphy Robinson.

If you could work with any musician at all in a future collaboration, who would that be and why?

Looks like I’m going to make something with Dälek in late 2023 and Will [Brooks] is an inspiration. We’ve known each other for more than a decade, toured together and we get along great, but we’ve never made stuff together, so that should shake things up. I just love making music with people.