caroline
Drop into a long-duration improvisational performance, taking in shards of a new sound touching on post-rock, emo, folk and minimalist classical.
caroline are an eight-person, London-based band playing tense yet expansive music.
The group began in early 2017, evolving out of weekly improvisation sessions, slowly expanding their on-stage membership as the songs developed.
Rough Trade released their debut single ‘Dark blue’ in March 2020, and the group were nominated as Ones To Watch at the 2020 AIM Awards.
Audiences can come and go as they please, catching different iterations of the eight-piece band throughout the event, with no experience being the same at any point.
A message from the band:
Today’s performance is an experiment. We aren’t going to be playing our regular songs, but will be making something new. We don’t know what we are going to make but it will consist of completely new music generated through improvising together, today in the Purcell Room, and possibly interspersed with fragments of preexisting ideas.
We’ll be performing for five hours because we want to give time and space to all the aspects of our creative process; the peaks in energy and the slumps where sometimes, maybe, nothing much happens at all. We want to try and expose all of this as part of the performance. We might end up developing some of the music that comes out of today, but also maybe not.
We’ve invited some friends to play with us at points over the day. Some of us have played together a lot, and others barely at all.
They include:
Geordie Greep and Cameron Picton of black midi
Jonas Pequeno, creating a visual accompaniment
Sullow, a new improvising trio, featuring Jacken Elswyth (banjo), Daniel S Evans (guitar), and Joshua Barfoot (percussion)
Experimental folk multi-instrumentalist Aga Ujma
Saxophonist and composer Nathan Pigott
Need to know
*Please note change of start time from originally advertised.
Dates & times
Price
- Standard entryFrom £15*
- Concessions25%**
* Excludes £3.50 booking fee.
Book as early as you can to ensure the best choice of tickets. Ticket prices may be adjusted without notice to reflect demand.
** Limited availability. Read about concessions.
Tickets can only be sold through the Southbank Centre and our authorised agents, and can't be resold. You can return your tickets to the Southbank Centre for a credit voucher up to 48 hours before the event. Tickets resold on any third-party platforms will become invalid.
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Venue
Purcell Room
Our number one priority is the health and wellbeing of our visitors and staff.
Open 90 minutes before an event until the end of the event. Closed at all other times.
Our address is: Southbank Centre, Belvedere Road, London SE1 8XX. The nearest tube and train stations within 5-7 minutes walk are Waterloo (Northern, Bakerloo, Jubilee and Waterloo & City lines) and Embankment (District & Circle lines). There are also lots of bus routes with stops 2-5 minutes from our venues. For more information on getting here by road, rail or river.
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If you don't receive your e-ticket
Your e-ticket will be sent to you seven days before the event date from [email protected]. If you don't receive your e-ticket, and it's not in your junk or spam folder, please get in touch.
More information
Find out all you need to know about tickets, including concessions, group bookings, returns, credit vouchers and more, via the link below.
Get an overview of the seating layout of the Purcell Room by downloading our seating plan.
Toilets
An accessible toilet is located in the foyer.
A Changing Places toilet is located on Level 1 Royal Festival Hall next to the JCB Glass Lift, for the exclusive use of disabled people who need personal assistance to use the toilet.
The facility includes a height-adjustable bench, tracking hoist system, a centrally-placed toilet, a height-adjustable basin and a shower. Please visit the Welcome Desk on Level 2, Royal Festival Hall, where a member of staff can provide you with the key. You can also use the phone next to the Changing Places toilet to speak to a member of staff. The facility is open daily 10am – 11pm.
Cloakroom
The Queen Elizabeth Hall and Purcell Room cloakroom is closed. You won’t be able to bring any bags over 40 x 25 x 25cm into the venues, so please leave large bags at home.
We're cash-free
Please note that we're unable to accept cash payments across our site.
Purcell Room is located in Queen Elizabeth Hall. For step-free access please use Royal Festival Hall JCB glass lift to Level 2 and enter via Riverside Terrace.
Talk to a member of staff at the auditorium entrance if you have a disability that means you can’t queue, or you need extra time to take your seat. They can arrange priority entry for you as soon as the doors open.
Please bear with us while we update our access map to reflect the refurbishment of the Royal Festival Hall’s Level 2 foyer spaces. The step-free routes remain the same.