Brian Eno announces dates for first-ever solo tour

The show will centre around Eno’s 2016 album, The Ship.

Ambient music legend and producer extraordinaire Brian Eno has announced the dates for his first-ever solo tour.

The ‘Ships’ tour will centre around Eno’s 2016 album, The Ship, and is said to feature both old and new compositions from his extensive catalogue. Fans can catch Eno on five shows across Europe, with the first occurring on 21 October in Venice, Italy.

Eno will be backed by the Baltic Sea Philharmonic (with conductor Kristjan Järvi), actor Peter Serafinowicz, as well as his longtime collaborators Leo Abrahams and Peter Chilvers.

“The album The Ship is an unusual piece in that it uses voice but doesn’t particularly rely on the song form,” Eno says in a statement. “It’s an atmosphere with occasional characters drifting through it, characters lost in the vague space made by the music. There’s a sense of wartime in the background, and a sense of inevitability. There is also a sense of scale which suits an orchestra, and a sense of many people working together.”

He adds, “I wanted an orchestra which played music the way I would like to play music: from the heart rather than just from the score. I wanted the players to be young and fresh and enthusiastic. When I first saw the Baltic Sea Philharmonic I found all that… and then noticed they were named after a sea. That sealed it!”

Just last month, the British musician joined forces with Fred again.. on a collaborative LP titled Secret Life. The record has been described by Text Records label head Four Tet as “the most beautiful album of 2023”.