The third cohort of our flagship artist development programme, In Motion, brings together 10 brilliant creators from across the UK for its 2026 edition.
Now in its third year, In Motion continues to build on our 18 year legacy of transformative artist development work, while responding to the changing needs of today’s creators. This year, we received 490 applications, a 9% increase on 2025 and a 38% increase on 2024, reflecting the demand for long-term, holistic and bespoke support and the vitality of original music-making across the UK.
In Motion is a unique 18 month long ‘artist-centred’ programme supporting innovative creators at pivotal moments in their journey — helping them explore ambitious ideas, evolve their practice and elevate their creativity and career.
Combining funding, mentoring, coaching, peer support and tailored professional development, the programme gives artists the space, support and confidence to realise their creative goals and produce boundary pushing new works that would not otherwise be possible.
At Sound and Music, we know artists need time, trust and meaningful, bespoke support to take risks and grow their confidence, creativity, audience and career. In Motion is that space for reflection, experimentation, connection and sustainable growth.
We are proud to be an Arts Council England National Portfolio Organisation and PRS Foundation Talent Development Network Partner supported by PPL. In Motion 2026 is made possible with the generous support of Arts Council England, PRS Foundation, The Cockayne Foundation and Sound UK.
Our 2026 Cohort
The In Motion 2026 cohort reflects the diversity, richness and originality of new music in the UK today.
Their work moves across improvisation, ritual, memory, technology, ecology, diaspora, voice, movement, data, place and performance. Across the cohort, artists are developing transcultural practices, site-responsive work and ambitious new ways of making music that stretch across form and genre.
What connects them is a shared commitment to risk, research, innovative and creative evolution. Over the next 18 months, In Motion will support each artist to deepen their practice, test new ideas, realise their creative aspirations and bring ambitious new work into the world and to audiences across the UK.
Our In Motion 2026 artists are: Alex Hitchcock, Amy Bryce, MA.MOYO, Christo Squier, Elischa Kaminer, Hannah Lou Larsen, Roxanna Albayati, SEAYOOL, Simmy Singh, and Sofia Grant.
Discover more about each creator below.
Alex Hitchcock
Alex Hitchcock is a London-born saxophonist, composer, arranger and producer inspired politically and musically by the radical Black American tradition, reckoning with its history, struggle, resistance and reinvention.
Visit Alex’s profile
Read Alex’s Q&A
Amy Bryce
Amy Bryce is a British composer based in London whose imaginative scores produce music that is strikingly visual or theatrical. Her work has been commissioned by BBC Radio 3, the London Symphony Orchestra, the Stiftung Kunst und Musik für Dresden, the National Youth Choirs of Great Britain and the Royal Philharmonic Society.
Visit Amy Bryce’s profile
Read Amy Bryce’s Q&A
MA.MOYO
Belinda Zhawi is a literary and sound artist based in London and Marseille, author of Small Inheritances, and works across sound/text performance as MA.MOYO. Her work has been featured on NTS, Boiler Room and BBC Radio.
Visit MA.MOYO‘s profile
Read MA.MOYO‘s Q&A
Christo Squier
Christo is a composer, installation artist and multi-instrumentalist whose practice sits at the intersection of science, art and performance. Currently, his work translates ideas from particle physics and sensory experience into immersive sonic environments.
Visit Christo Squier’s profile
Read Christo Squier’s Q&A
Elischa Kaminer
Elischa Kaminer is a composer, performer and theatre-maker working on the intersections of music theatre, electronic, concert, queer-pop and yiddish musics. His work has been showcased across Europe, the U.S., Canada and Korea including performances at Muziekgebouw Amsterdam and Nationaltheater Mannheim.
Visit Elischa Kaminer’s profile
Read Elischa Kaminer’s Q&A
Hannah Lou Larsen
Hannah is a Danish Oxford-based composer and multi-instrumentalist. First drawn to music by overwriting cassette tapes of church sermons with a hairdryer and her brother’s asthmatic breathing, her solo show Pigeons in Transit sold out at Offbeat Festival 2024, and Before the Ashes Lose Their Leaves has featured at Radiophrenia and XMTR Fest.
Visit Hannah’s profile
Read Hannah’s Q&A
Roxanna Albayati
Roxanna Albayati is an Iranian-Iraqi interdisciplinary artist, researcher and music educator. Driven by embodied artistic research, her transcultural practice centres around combining experimental music with multilingual art forms and audio-visuals, where her music merges cross-cultural improvisation with Persian Dastgah and the physicality of performance.
Visit Roxanna Albayati’s profile
Read Roxanna Albayati’s Q&A
SEAYOOL
SEAYOOL, a composer and performer, experiments with the ‘expansion of senses’ by traversing between the piri, a traditional Korean instrument, and electronic music. He explores human inner senses by interweaving the piri’s primal expressiveness with digital sounds, transforming breath into electronic waves and classical melodies into experimental rhythms.
Visit SEAYOOL’s profile
Read SEAYOOL’s Q&A
Simmy Singh
Simmy Singh is a violinist, composer, and Earth activist whose work dissolves the boundaries between classical, folk, electronic, and improvisational sound. Born in Cymru to Indian and English parents, her creative voice is rooted in a deep connection to land, lineage, and the sacred.
Visit Simmy Singh’s profile
Read Simmy Singh’s Q&A
Sofia Grant
A rising star on the UK jazz scene, Sofia writes about our relationship with the natural world. Lyrically bold and vocally dextrous, her songs about permafrost, species decline and degradation of mountains place her at the cutting edge of climate and sound.
Visit Sofia Grant’s profile
Read Sofia Grant’s Q&A
The panel and selection
We would like to thank our external selection panel — Chisara Agor, Bróna McVittie, James Perry, Provhat Rahman, Sarah Lianne Lewis and Suk-Jun Kim — alongside Sound and Music’s Creative Programme Leaders, for the care, insight and time they brought to the selection process.
As part of our commitment to fairness, transparency and inclusive decision-making, external panels are refreshed each year, ensuring a range of perspectives and experiences are represented throughout the selection process.
With thanks to our funders and partners
Sound and Music is a PRS Foundation Talent Development Network Partner supported by PPL.
In Motion 2026 is made possible with the generous support of Arts Council England. PRS Foundation, The Cockayne Foundation and Sound UK.
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