Few people tracking the massive return of Oasis would have picked the Royal Festival Hall as the place to see Noel Gallagher step out on his own again. Rather than easing into a conventional rock club warm up, the guitarist is heading to the Southbank Centre this November. He will share a stage with Goldie for two symphonic concerts at the EFG London Jazz Festival, trading stadium choruses for an orchestral collaboration across two separate sets in a single evening.
The shows, running under the banner Dare To Dream, take place on Saturday, November 14, with performances scheduled for 5pm and 8pm. Goldie has assembled a sprawling setup for the date, placing his full live band alongside an orchestra and a choir. Gallagher is not the only guest on the bill. Skunk Anansie frontwoman Skin will take part, as will drummer and producer Yussef Dayes, French-Senegalese artist anaiis, and jazz vocalists Cleveland Watkiss and Natalie Williams. Organizers plan to reveal additional participants as the festival approaches.
The union between a Britpop songwriter and a drum and bass pioneer is less unusual than it looks on paper. The pair have known each other for three decades, dating back to when Gallagher laid down guitar parts for Temper Temper on Goldie's 1998 record Saturnz Return. When breaking the news of Gallagher's appearance on social media, Goldie pulled out his old rolodex to show the contact card, pointing to those thirty years of shared history. He also took the opportunity to address early sceptics who predicted his music would not survive five years, noting that thirty-five years on he is still staging major concert hall productions that mix original compositions with older catalogue material.
The Dare To Dream double header sits inside the thirty-fourth edition of the EFG London Jazz Festival, which takes over more than seventy venues across the capital from November 13 to November 22. Things begin on November 13 with the traditional Jazz Voice gala at the Royal Festival Hall, where vocalists including Lizz Wright, Emma Smith, Marvin Muoneké, Liv Warfield, and Rita Wilson will pay tribute to artists who passed away in 2016, such as Prince and Leonard Cohen. That opening evening also features a centenary salute to John Coltrane at the Barbican and a Miles Davis hundredth birthday performance at EartH. Over the following ten days, programmes at the Royal Albert Hall, Abney Park Chapel, Ninety One Brick Lane, and the British Airways Arc will feature Asha Puthli, Church of Sound, and the London Philharmonic Orchestra.
For Gallagher, stepping into the Royal Festival Hall is a marked departure from his recent schedule. It represents his first live appearance without Oasis since his 2024 headline slot at Y Not festival with the High Flying Birds, which happened just before the group went public with their Live '25 tour and the Don't Look Back In Anger documentary. Apart from dropping in on Chicken Shop Date during its final run, he has kept a relatively low profile while preparing for a sold out Live '27 run that takes in forty-two dates across the UK, Europe, and North America, including eleven evenings at Manchester's Etihad Stadium and six at Knebworth.
In between those tour logistics, Gallagher has stayed active in the studio. The High Flying Birds have not released a full record since Council Skies arrived in 2023, but fresh tracks are already underway. Johnny Marr mentioned over the summer that Gallagher had been busy writing and recording new material, though Marr admitted he had no idea whether the songs were destined for Oasis, the solo project, or something else entirely. Playing with Goldie gives Gallagher a brief change of pace, offering one of his few left-field live appearances before the next round of stadium commitments begins.
