"Born Ilford,East London, 22 August 1955; soprano, alto and baritone saxophones, voice.

After a short period in Manchester, deciding that the possibilit of a career in librarianship was not for him, Alan Wilkinson moved to Leeds in 1975 to undertake a Fine Arts degree, concentrating on painting. Shortly after completing his degree he began playing the alto saxophone and joined the group Crow with Mathew Coe (aka Xero Slingsby), Richard Ward, and long-time associate, drummer Paul Hession. Following a short tour of Belgium and Holland, he decided to quit painting and concentrate on the saxophone. In 1979 he formed the group Art, Bart & Fargo with Hession and tenor sax player Pete Malham,experimenting with playing a wide range of other instruments, mainly percussion, and mixing composition with pure improvisation. After playing in England, Belgium and Germany the trio disbanded after three years.

In 1982 Wilkinson attended the Improvised Music Summer School in South Wales and this introduced him to musicians such as Peter Brötzmann, Barry Guy, Fred Van Hove, Keith Tippett, Phil Wachsmann and Radu Malfatti among others. This led directly to gigs on the London improvised music scene, a trio with Paul Hession and Japanese pianist Akemi Kuniyoshi, and many gigs with drummer Steve Hubback in a wide variety of combinations. In 1983, in duo with Hession, he appeared at the 10th annual Free Music festival in Antwerp, Belgium and at the Holland Art Initiative in Eindhoven. The same year he was among the original organisers of the Termite Club in Leeds, specialising in improvised and experimental music and performing arts. A trio with Steve Noble and Tony Moore existed from 1985 to 1988, having toured in Britain, Belgium, Holland and Denmark and in 1985 Wilkinson also joined the large improvising ensemble The Ubiquity Orchestra. From 1987 to 1989 Wilkinson's activities included a widely toured quartet with Willi Kellers, Christoph Winckel and Alex Maguire (through to 1992); a tour of England and Wales with Phil Durrant, Thebe Lipere, Will Evans, Louis Moholo and Keith Tippett; gigs with Mick Beck's large group Feet Packets; and a tour of England with Alex Maguire's nine-piece Cat o'Nine Tails.

Alan Wilkinson has been invited to play in Derek Bailey's Company on a number of occasions, firstly in 1987 on a tour of Switzerland and Italy with Steve Noble, Barre Phillips and Ernst Reijseger; again in 1988 at the ICA in London in a Company Week which included Dennis Palmer, LaDonna Smith, Gregg Bendian and Milo Fine; and in 1993 he helped organise and participated in Company Week at the Place Theatre with, among others, Don Byron, Robyn Schulkowski, Ikue Mori and Phil Minton. Other associations have included a stint with the John Law Quartet; playing with the London group Ya Basta; Real Time, with artist Gina Southgate and drummer Mark Sanders joined occasionally by Maggie Nicols or Susanna Ferrar. He has also played solo gigs since 1991.

Alan Wilkinson is probably best known as a member of the take no prisoners Hession/ Wilkinson/Fell trio formed with the addition of Simon Fell to the longstanding duo in 1989. Though perhaps correctly typified as a high energy power trio - starting loud and then opening the throttles - and the recorded evidence goes some way to support this proposition, there are not only areas of respite in the playing but also an interest in fitting the group into new situations. For example, in 1996 a short UK tour took place in June with US guitarist Joe Morris (with a CD forthcoming on Incus); and in November the trio appeared in an incendiary, ear-numbing, exhausting and hugely enjoyable interchange with Derek Bailey at the annual Termite Festival in Leeds: a gig that the organiser's attempted unsuccessfully and on several occasions to end prematurely (this being Sunday night in a pub in the UK), finally resorting to flashing the room lights and talking loudly; Derek Bailey, having been sat head down in concentration for the uninterrupted 40 minutes of the second piece then looking up blinking, seemingly surprised at the near panic. The following night, Wilkinson and Fell undertook a four date tour of the UK with a quartet completed by Peter Brötzmann and Willi Kellers, reprising a similar tour by the same musicians in 1994."

"Since his first releases in the early 80s, uncompromising Belgian artist Dirk Serries has garnered respect from and invitations to collaborate with recognised musicians like Steven Wilson, Steve Von Till, Justin Broadrick, Cult Of Luna and Alan Sparhawk of Low. He has been commisioned to write works for Dutch national television broadcaster VPRO, the Antwerp Zoo as well as architectural festival Biënnale Rotterdam and worked on stage with the Holland Symfonia orchestra. His discography encompasses stylistically diverse releases on labels like Relapse, Projekt, Conspiracy as well as his current creative partner Tonefloat, an outfit with years of experience in vinyl editions for acts like Porcupine Tree, Robert Fripp, Theo Travis and Anja Garbarek. Over the past thirty years, he has toured extensively through Europe and the USA and performed at some of experimental music's major venues and concert spaces, as headliner or in support of Low, Mono, My Bloody Valentine, Jesu and others.

Dirk Serries never shied away from collaborations with Justin Broadrick, Steve Roach, Sam Rosenthal, Alio Die, Theo Travis, David Lee Myers, Asmus Tietchens, Stratosphere, Serge Devadder, Willem Tanke or under seperate entities like The Sleep Of Reason (with Jon Attwood), Continuum (with Steven Wilson), Principle Of Silence (with Joris De Backer), The Eightfold Model (with Michael Beckett), Akhet (with Marc Verhaeghen, Paul Van Den Berg), 3 Seconds Of Air (with Martina Verhoeven, Paul Van Den Berg) and The Black Fire (with Robert MacManus).

After bringing his projects vidnaObmana (1984-2005) and Fear Falls Burning (2005-2012) to a satisfying conclusion, Serries no longer considers it necessary to hide behind alter egos. Confident enough to operate under his own name, he is continuing his ongoing search for uncharted territory while keeping in mind the essence which made him want to work with sound in the first place. Fascinated by the power of purity, he has built a reputation for building a personal galaxy of harmony and dissonance through dense caleidoscopes of slowly unfolding motives. His upcoming second microphonics-album is a further refinement of this approach. Eschewing stereotypical genre exercises, Serries refuses to be labeled as a guitarist, weilding his instrument in a way which never denies its original tonal colours while bringing out the unique intimacy of his music.

Released in 2008, Serries's debut studio album under his own name was all about analog warmth and natural acoustics. For his second full-length and in a bid of creating the perfect sonic space, he has now taken on the challenge of engaging in a dialogue with digital processing. Lyricaly titled 'microphonics xxi - xxv - mounting among the the wings, there's a light in vein. the burden of hope across thousands of rivers', the album was released to critical acclaim in March 2013 on renowned Dutch label Tonefloat as a CD and double 10″ vinyl.

The sobriety of his studio work is mirrored by Serries's philosophy to performing live, based on the concept that music should be heard, not seen. Focussed like a monk immersed in prayer, he is performing his music almost in complete darkness and entirely in real-time, making use of both electric amplification and the natural resonance of the room and taking the particular characteristics of each venue into consideration. This way, not a single gig sounds the same as the night before.

While writing the follow-up to his second microphonics solo album, his ongoing fascination for jazz for more than 15 years solidified in 2011 when he was invited by improv and jazz musicians Kristoffer Lo and Tomas Järmyr to form YODOK III. Recording their debut album, completely performed real-time, at the legendary Athletic Sound Studio in Halden (Norway), brought projects in a rapid stream and on the right track. Teaming up with both musicians, in their trio format and with Tomas Järmyr on drums as duo THE VOID OF EXPANSION, Serries collaborates as well with Belgian jazzdrummer Teun Verbruggen as ART OF COSMIC MUSINGS and goes into a duel with Dead Neanderthals, Cactus Truck's American sax player John Dikeman and Dutch drummer Onno Govaert, UK saxophonist Colin Websters, UK drummers Andrew Lisle and Steve Noble. Born was Tonefloat's New Wave Of Jazz and the future foresees no boundaries, 30 years and onwards."