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English vocalist and composer and "movement artist" Elaine Mitchener (born in London to Jamaican parents), a member of the avantgarde group Apartment House (formed by the cellist Anton Lukoszevieze in 1995), scored and choreographed music theatre and performance art projects such as
Of Leonardo da Vinci (2015),
Industrialising Intimacy (2015)
Vocal Classics of the Black Avant Garde (2017),
Sweet Tooth (2017),
The Rolling Calf (2018),
Jeanne Lee Project (2019),
The then + The now = Now time (2019),
On Being Human as Praxis (2020),
etc.
Solo Throat (Otoroku, 2024), her first solo release, contains
12 brief lieder on texts written by
African-American and African-Caribbean poets.
They explore different tones and textures in different combinations of free-form chanting,
the discipline invented by
Joan LaBarbara and
Meredith Monk five decades earlier.
The songs are strictly a-cappella. They can last only 30 seconds or several minutes, depending on how much she decides to repeat a vocal trick.
Stretchedwoundspeaks (a whopping six minutes) is the one that gets closer
to Monk's narrative style.
Rush Hush has perhaps the most cacophonous effects.
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