Drummer Dave Lombardo, co-founder of American metal band Slayer, will join a series of exclusive 2014 Adelaide Festival concerts with avant-garde musician John Zorn.

Festival artistic director David Sefton said he was thrilled to announce this morning that “superstar” Lombardo would join what he described as a stellar line-up of almost 40 Zorn collaborators.

The drummer, who split with Slayer earlier this year just before the band headed to Australia for Soundwave, is also a member of experimental metal group Fantômas and founder of the band Philm. He will feature on the third night of the four-night Zorn in Oz series, playing drums alongside Zorn on alto-sax and bass player Bill Laswell in an improvisational trio named Bladerunner.

Bladerunner originally debuted in 2000 as a quartet with guitar-player Fred Firth.

“This line-up went on to tour select venues around Europe, with Zorn masterfully leading the heavyweight improvising band to create music both urgent and succinct, scrambled and ferocious, lush and atmospheric,” the Adelaide Festival said in a statement.

The Zorn concerts will take place in the Festival Theatre from March 11-15, 2014, and incorporate everything from classical compositions, to rock, a cappella and Brazilian percussion.

Other collaborators taking part include Mike Patton (Faith No More, Fantômas, Mr Bungle), Bill Laswell (Iggy Pop, Herbie Hancock), Marc Ribot (Tom Waites, Elvis Costello), Joey Baron (David Bowie, Michael Jackson) and John Medeski (Medeski Martin & Wood).