Asis is a new collaboration between four of Britain's finest musicians working in world music. They continue to develop a very flexible approach to composing and playing which is rooted in a number of different cultures. The quartet includes specialists in Indonesian, Jazz, Middle Eastern, Indian Classical and Western European contemporary music. In their spirit of collaboration and experimentation they draw on the accomplished performance skills and philosophies of these diverse backgrounds. Their concerts are rich and spectacular events as much as musical ones - an extraordinary array of instruments are on stage and they are working towards the incorporation of a large scale video projection in live events in the future.

The members of Asis are:- Ansuman Biswas (percussion), Jan Hendrickse (woodwinds), Adrian Lee (oud, siter) and Nathan Thomson (double bass).

While the quartet is a new venture they have all played together previously in various combinations. Over many years they have been involved in music education projects, schools projects, theatre in education and academic ensemble research work. They have composed and performed music for film and TV as well as theatrical productions at the National Theatre and Royal Shakespeare Company. With the current line-up they have played at a Somali/Bangladeshi joint conference in October 2002 and also organised a project examining trans-cultural issues in music and the role of improvisation, which took place at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in November 2002. They have just completed a two week residency in Tanzania (April 2003) in which they collaborated with local musicians.