| Mar 30, 2019 (Sat) / 7:30 pm - 10:00 pm Buy Tickets here: https://moirasmileyseattle.brownpapertickets.com |
| Venue: Phinney Center Concert Hall, Brick Building, 6532 Phinney Ave N, Seattle |
Moira Smiley is a Singer / Composer who creates and performs new work for voices. A musical polyglot, and vocal shape-shifter, her voice and composing are heard on feature films, BBC & PBS television programs, NPR, and on more than 60 albums. She accompanies herself with banjo, accordion, piano and percussive movement, and when shes not leading her own group, moira smiley & VOCO, Moira has toured with Indie artist tUnE-yArDs, Irish super-group, Solas, The Lomax Project and Billy Childs Laura Nyro Re-Imagined. Shes also toured with Paul Hilliers Theater of Voices and KITKA. Recent solo performances include TED, Stravinskys Les Noces, the London Proms Festival, features on BBC Radio3, and ABC Australias Books & Artsprograms.
Moira’s recordings feature spare, vocally driven collections of warped traditional songs, original polyphony and body percussion. She is a well-known choral composer (recent commissions included for Los Angeles Master Chorale) and arranger, with millions of singers around the world singing her works. In 2018, she released a solo album and choral songbook called Unzip The Horizon.
Moira’s solo show, The Voice Is A Traveler, features Moira’s magnificent voice weaving together her own arresting songs with the unusual traditional American, East European and Anglo-Celtic songs shes studied and collected all her life. She shows how the singing voice has been our companion in times of exile and emigration, and how its essential in expressing our belonging together. Tender, sparse, banjo or accordion accompanied songs mix with lush, multi-layered, harmony-rich soundscapes.
Unzip the Horizon is a sublime tapestry of 21st-century world music and a poetic testament to the transformative nature of singing the truth.
SONGLINESMoira Smileys song Refugee immediately caught my ear with its timely message and the urgency of her singing. There are many styles and themes on her mosaic of an album, Unzip the Horizon.
KCRWs New & Noteworthy ReleaseWhether shes carrying a slow-burning torch above sparse sounds a notch beyond ambient (One Step Dance), addressing a global problem on a personal level (Refugee,) or leading achorus in understated celebration (Sing About It), Smiley makes every word & inflection cut deep.
ROOTSWORLD
Moira will also present two workshops in Seattle, hosted by Frontier Home. Contact Frontier Home for more info (links to Facebook events are below)
Embodying Folk Songs for Song Leaders & Singers – Friday March 29, 7:30 – 9PM
https://www.facebook.com/events/2117942934941791/
Your Own WIld Voice – Saturday March 30, 12:30 – 2PM
https://www.facebook.com/events/366483657414763/