BIO
I am Laonikos (he/him), a shakuhachi player, arts professional, and coach based in London. I am Head of Programmes at Sound and Music, I am a board member at the European Shakuhachi Society, and I am co-founder of artArctica. In my creative work I explore how, through arts and wilderness experiences, we can connect to ourselves, to each other, and to the world around us.
In March 2025 I wrote an article on how AI might change our listening habits for VAN Magazine, and a couple of years ago I gave a graduation speech for Sibelius Academy graduates which summarises my philosophy around my practice, ecology, and community.
I recently recorded the shakuhachi for the Japan Pavillion at the London Design Biennale 2025, composed by Midori Komachi, as part of an installation designed by SEKISUI HOUSE - KUMA LAB and curated by Clare Farrow.
My latest album loess was released on Slow Tone Collages. In 2022 I was awarded a DYCP grant by Arts Council England to deepen my shakuhachi playing and making practice. I am studying with Kakizakai Kaoru and I am a Making Tracks 2020 Fellow. I hold a master's degree in Global Music studying with Nathan Riki Thomson and wrote my dissertation on Rewilding Music, and I previously studied composition with Paul Newland at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama.
I play shakuhachi, improvise, teach, and I am an accredited relational dynamics coach. I also design websites and love creating websites for artists and creatives that are affordable and easy to maintain. If you'd like to work with me, get in touch.
You can drop me a message on Instagram, Bluesky, Facebook - I'm @laonikos or @laonikoss pretty much everywhere.
LOESS
The word “loess” (LOW-ess) refers to a type of sediment that is the result of wind depositing small amounts of dust on the same location over geological time. Visiting and recording in the same place over several years, this project has been about deepening my awareness of the place - my music when I retun each time is changed, each visit another layer deposited.
This is very patient music. Calm, as you might expect, and expansive - our ears expand to listen along with and through the musician, as he attempts to adopt the timescale of the creatures that inhabit this environment. The player's attention is steady and his stamina impressive, in what may be some of the slowest music you've heard"
- Clive Bell (read full review)
Limited edition of 50 printed copies only.
BUY / LISTEN
"...beyond these occasional foreground brushstrokes, there is just the distant sound of the motorway and the occasional train, or the footsteps of very eager dog walkers on the south banks of the river — a soft balance of sounds where human and the more-than-human coexist fairly peacefully, as residents of the land around River Lea.
"I double-check everything is connected. I exhale, take a deep breath and blow, doing my best to blend in and offer my own sounds in this morning’s dawn chorus."
BAMBOO Magazine, Autumn/Winter 2022 Issue
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