"NASA. That would be awesome. A synchronised shuttle launch…”, muses Polymath’s Tom Walsh as he once again puts aside his sandwich to contemplate a future creative feeding frenzy for his band and their ideal collaborator.

Clearly, gigging in zero-gravity would quite rightly not be sniffed at by the Polymath massive. However, slightly closer to home, four months and a lot of what they’ve coined ‘creative vampirism’ later, the band has just put on its first ever ‘Live Extravaganza’ at the very charming Nottingham Arts Theatre.

See, what makes Polymath such an intriguing prospect as a musical endeavour – as well as the startlingly dark, yearning yet hummable tunes - is that the band is an open-source project, which means that anyone who wants to be part of the Polymath vision, can. Collaborations, lyrics, chord progressions, art; whatever you have got to give can be fed in to the band’s creative process, chewed on and integrated into something Polymathian in nature.

The foursome at the heart of Polymath – Tom Walsh, vocals, keyboards; Amy Nicholson, cello; Ali Harris, guitars; Mike Holt, percussion – believe in putting on a proper show. True to the name (a polymath is ‘a master of many disciplines’ to save you trying to locate your dictionary), the Live Extravaganza corralled a plethora of collaborations with other artists from a range of disciplines, delivering the sights, sensations and sounds promised by a journey into Polyworld.

The first Extravaganza debuted the first fruits of the Polymath concept. Extraordinary contemporary dancers Vonnegut’s Girls premiered ‘Not Amalgam Virgo’ with the band; local animator and fine artist Lateral Lines created an animation to accompany the band’s track, ‘Sonrisa’ – a jaw-droppingly beautiful and harrowing display of digital art; live performance collective Mischief Makers brought a cheeky activist edge to proceedings and The Dust Collectors brought their acclaimed mélange of psychedelia and jazz to the eager audience.

Now that the first Live Extravaganza mission is complete, the band has got its eye on making it a regular occurrence at the Arts Theatre. “We’d like to do the next one in October or November. Now that we’ve done the first one and learned from it, we’re ready to do it again. We’ve been talking to a Chinese eight-piece orchestra about doing something with them, which would be an amazing show”, say’s Tom.

Want to get involved? Well, as the band say: “Get in touch. Enter stage right. Do not wait for the epilogue.”

You can get involved and find out more at www.polymathematics.co.uk

Check out the gallery for this event.

Photos by Dom Henry (c)

Polymath played the Polymath Live Extravaganza at theNottingham Arts Theatre on Saturday May 3 2008.

Nottingham Arts Theatre website

 

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