Description
Music from the wonderful Christiane Hommeslheim who presented a workshop and performance at Giving Voice 13, April 2015, Falmouth
The vocalist Christiane Hommelsheim presents her first solo album under the mysterious name “Shadows, Fairies and Me”.
On entering the room of “Shadows” one encounters the many voices of Christiane Hommelsheim. You can hear her voice in all shades: it gurgles, whispers, whines, sings and speaks, sometimes alone, then in duet or with a choir. From a simple melody, a simple rhythm sometimes grows outlandish songs or timeless hymns. This solo polyphony is possible through the virtuoso use of a Loop sampler. The machine is here an instrument and takes on the role of companion, replacing the band or orchestra. Simultaneously, the loop forms the style of recurring themes like love, loneliness, death. The Loop as an endless loop of life, a media mantra.
Stimulated by intense vocal work in the Roy-Hart method (“The voice is the muscle of the soul”)and in the tradition of American singers like Meredith Monk or Shelley Hirsch, Christiane Hommelsheim looks in her artistic work for the essence of voice and the relationships between voice, body and consciousness. While others may have made an appearance as a co-performer – David Moss or vocal acrobat duo “Haarmann Hommelsheim”- she now dares with “Shadows” to go it alone, but accompanied by their many voices.
