makes performances emerging from the collaborative work of choreographer Maya M. Carroll and composer Roy Carroll. They create work that is unflinchingly sensual, characterised by an almost molecular tactility encountering fantastic viscerality. The Instrument works in close collaboration with a diverse circle of artists, taking an integrated approach that radiates outwards from a clear movement and sound aesthetic, permeating all aspects of the work, scenography, lighting design, graphic and visual art.

Maya and Roy have been working together since 2006, creating over 40 works for the stage. They formed The Instrument in 2011. They are Berlin based while devising and presenting work internationally.

Maya Matilda Carroll is a choreographer, dancer, mentor and teacher, based in Europe since 2004. For over twenty years she has been creating independent dance work and performance, collaborating with dancers, musicians, actors, poets and visual artists. Maya's work is centred on her embodiment of sound/music, the profound physicality and exploration of vocabulary in her pieces. Maya formed The Instrument (2011) with her life and artistic-work partner; composer / musician Roy Carroll. Their long-standing collaboration is a unique experience of detail and atmosphere within which Maya continues to expand her choreographic language. Through The Instrument Maya initiates and is involved in productions that range between independent projects and larger scale commissions. As a teacher, Maya leads master classes and workshops in Europe and abroad, extensively developing her teaching alongside her artistic work; drawn from and towards the human, social and poetic manifestation of the dancing body.

"I see my choreographic work as an embodied expression of primal - cultural longings; rooted in existence which craves creativity. The pieces become immersive universes; a listening space within which the 'real and imagined' are questioned and exposed simultaneously. In the act of creating and performing I sense the languages of gesture, dance, light, sound/music and image; emerging both naked and autonomous. I am moved by a 'knowing innocence' which can be transformative for our minds and bodies in profound ways because it reaches below our opinions and expectations, to a place, an emotion, a dream we may all recognize and share. In this delicate and wild experience I find myself dancing with elements that attract, concern and fascinate me. Each piece is a world, a ritual, a journey which I invite the audience to travel into".

Between 1997-2000 Maya danced in Muza dance company, Tel-Aviv, Israel. She collaborated with choreographer Lara Barsacq over five years (1999-2004, Tel-Aviv - Paris). Between 2000-2003 Maya danced in Batsheva Ensemble company, directed by Ohad Naharin. She also danced works choreographed by Anat Danieli, Sharon Eyal and Arkadi Zaides to name a few. In 2005 Maya joined Research Project with Sasha Waltz & Guests in Berlin. Since 2013 she collaborates with choreographer and director Julyen Hamilton. She has been part of his company Allen's Line and performed in the pieces; Goat Ocean, Mud Like Gold, The Light Beneath Reaches, BURST!, Thirst, The Eclipse of Reason and Child of Day

Roy Carroll is an Irish musician and composer, based in Berlin. He works primarily with electroacoustic media; which encompasses transducers, synthesis, feedback, audio recordings, amplification, software, - auditory and psychoacoustic phenomena even. With these materials, Carroll instigates processes that ruthlessly investigate timbre, articulation, gesture, form and so on. His self-made devices and instruments span the entire timbral spectrum. Carroll's work takes the atomic particles of music making, traverses acoustic preparations and extended techniques; and collides with signal processing and amplification. Feedback, the horror of an instrument hearing itself, is a recurring component of Carroll's work, creating multi-layered forms that continually renegotiate the transformation of electrical audio signals into disturbed air. Collaborations include The Instrument, Paroxysm, The Monophonic Havel, Splitter Orchester, Voutchkova/Thieke/Carroll, Hamilton Carroll.

roycarroll.com

The Instrument practice offers an in-depth physicality and exploration of body and mind in our compositional space/time. Our practice engages with the study of improvisation through flow, precision and bodily wisdom; as a pathway to dance making and performance. Involving attentiveness, musicality, collective and individual awareness; we work with presence, choice, vision and the interplay between movement and image. Involving these elements in the process of dance making, the work draws upon relationships between people, environments and choreographic narratives.

Maya teaches classes / workshops in Europe and abroad, for free-scene platforms as well as academies and international companies. In the past twenty years Maya has been a guest teacher at HZT University (Berlin), Staatstheater Kassel (Johannes Wieland), Theater Greifswald (Jan Pusch), Impulstanz (Vienna), Fabrik Potsdam, Carte Blanche (Bergen), Présomptions de Présences (Paris), CND Lyon, CNSMD Lyon, CCNR Rillieux (Cie Yuval Pick), Le Pacifique / CDC (Grenoble), Glasgow Theatre and Arts Collective (Glasgow), SOZO (Kassel), Kelim Choreography Center (Bat-Yam, IL), Hochschule für Musik und Tanz (Köln), SEAD Academy (Salzburg) and Folkwang University (Essen).

Roy and Maya also conduct workshops together, in which they engage their collaborative experience within a process of group learning and dancing with live sound / music.