Thank you for visiting my website! I’m a recorder player, vocalist, improviser, facilitator and researcher based in London, UK.

I am currently working on my research project: 'Carrying Each Others' Hearts with Our Ears': A Community Music and Research Project for Muslims in London and Greater Manchester, funded through a Hallsworth Fellowship (2025-2028) at the University of Manchester. From 2023-2025, I was a researcher at the UK’s biggest music therapy charity, Nordoff & Robbins - you can read my research report about our research project on music therapy dementia care environments here. From 2024-2025, I was also a Research Resident at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, where I led a community project, ‘Sawt al-Shifaa’ about Muslim experiences of sound, music and healing - you can read our co-created zine about the project here.

I completed my PhD in Music at Cambridge University in 2022, supported by an AHRC studentship. My project was about what historical improvisation practices can tell us about cultural, social, and political exchanges between early modern England and Ottoman Turkey, Syria and Palestine.

I’m also a recorder player and vocalist, and the work closest to my heart is improvisation-based. I was a founding member of the baroque quartet Improviso and performed with them all over the UK and Europe until the Covid lockdown of 2020. Since then, I have been exploring a wide range of improvisation-based practice both solo and with collaborators. I have worked as a musician at many NHS hospitals, and as a member of Live Music Now at care homes and community centres.

In October 2022 I released my first album, bulbul, which draws on improvisation and poetry to tell stories about birds, voices, home, and the spaces in between. My first book, Improvising Otherwise was published open access in April 2025 by Open Book Publishers.

You can follow me on instagram @fictionalfatima to keep updated with performances, and listen to my music on most streaming platforms.

To contact me, go to the ‘contact’ page on the website. Thank you!