Sospeso presents the American premiere of Adrian Utley's work The Sound of Claudia Schiffer, a multimedia collaboration with legendary film director Nicholas Roeg, on Thursday and Friday, March 14 and 15, 2002, at the Miller Theater in New York.

Adrian Utley, a composer and jazz guitarist, forms part of the celebrated electronica group Portishead. Portishead were named after the sleepy port on the south-west coast of England where the group's founder, Geoff Barrow (b. Weston-Super-Mare, Avon, England), spent his teens. His intentions in forming the band were simple: "I just wanted to make interesting music, proper songs with a proper life span and a decent place in people's record collections." 

With the aid of an Enterprise Allowance grant, Barrow recruited Utley as guitarist and music director, as well as drummer/programmer Dave MacDonald and vocalist Beth Gibbons (b. Keynsham, Bristol, Avon, England), whom he encountered on a job creation scheme while she was singing Janis Joplin covers in a pub. Together they recorded a soundtrack and film, To Kill A Dead Man, with themselves as actors because "we couldn't find anyone else to do the parts". At this point they came to the attention of A&R man Ferdy Unger-Hamilton at the Go! Discs subsidiary, Go! Beat, who encouraged Barrow to remix Gabrielle's Dreams. He was sufficiently impressed with the results to sign the band immediately, despite several other interested parties.

Portishead's earliest singles, Numb and Sour Times, emerged to positive press reaction, although their debut album slipped in and out of the charts with little fanfare. Marketing proved difficult, as Barrow and Gibbons were reluctant to do interviews, and initially had no interest in playing live. The press campaign was therefore unusual, featuring painted mannequin dummies distributed in strategic locations throughout London, ensuring press coverage outside of the mainstream media. Word of mouth continued to push the band's profile and, with virtually no radio support, their third single, Glory Box, entered the UK charts at number 13 in January 1995.

Aided by a distinctive, gender-swapping video (visuals are central to the band's approach), Glory Box appeared just after several Album Of The Year awards for Dummy from magazines as diverse as Mixmag, ID, The Face and Melody Maker. Mixing torch songs with blues, jazz and hip-hop, Portishead's sound became known as "trip-hop". The interest also translated to America, where the album sold over 150,000 copies without the band even setting foot there. They were then awarded the Mercury Music Prize for best album of 1995. Following their success, the band were invited to contribute to several soundtracks, including two low-budget art movies and Tank Girl.

The long-awaited follow-up to Dummy was delayed when Barrow, a self-confessed perfectionist, reached a creative impasse that almost destroyed the band. His perseverance paid off, however, when Portishead was released in September 1997 to excellent critical reviews. Although the first single All Mine suggested some variation to the Portishead sound, the album covered essentially the same ground as their debut, albeit in an impressively stylish manner. 

Utley names Jimi Hendrix, John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Elvin Jones, Stevie Wonder, Ennio Morricone, Mick Ronson, Herbie Hancock, Howlin Wolf, A Tribe Called Quest, Public Enemy, Radiohead, the Beatles, Nirvana, Ravi Shankar, Gustave Mahler, Muddy Waters, Claude Debussy, Wes Montgomery, and Joy Division among music that "has been and is an inspiration."

From Excite Music.