Women’s vocal ensemble to bring harmonies to Goshen College
Concert: Moira Smiley & VOCO
Date and time: Friday, Jan. 17, 2014, 7:30 p.m.
Location: Goshen College Music Center’s Sauder Concert Hall
Cost: $7 adults, $5 seniors/students. GC students free with valid ID.
Website: www.moirasmiley.com
Moira Smiley & VOCO, a women’s vocal ensemble, will present their diverse repertoire ranging from American folksong to Eastern European music on Friday, Jan. 17. The visiting artist concert will take place at 7:30 p.m. in Sauder Concert Hall in the Goshen College Music Center.
Tickets for the concert are $7 adults, $5 seniors/students, available at the door beginning one hour before the concert. Goshen College faculty, staff and students are free with ID.
Moira Smiley & VOCO blend voices and redefine harmony singing with the power and physicality of folksong, the avant-garde fearlessness of Béla Bartók and the delightful, vaudevillian accompaniment of cello, banjo, ukulele, accordion and body percussion. Smiley’s award-winning original music and spellbinding folksongs light up the stage with playful movement and warm wit.
Named number one a cappella group in the U.S. in 2007, Moira Smiley & VOCO bring the energy of street singing and the elegance of a string quartet. Called “fascinating and multi-lingual” by the LA Times, “persuasive, near perfect musicians” by the Herald Times and “gritty and ethereal” by The Village Voice.
Smiley is a singer and composer who travels the world as a soloist and musical director, and creates new work for vocal ensembles, dance, theater and film. Her voice is heard on feature films, BBC & PBS television programs, frequently on NPR, and on more than 60 commercially released albums. Recent performances include TED, Stravinsky’s Les Noces, the London Proms Festival and features on KPCC’s Off Ramp and ABC Australia’s Books & Arts programs. Smiley’s recordings feature spare, vocally driven collections of warped traditional songs, original polyphony and the playful energy of body percussion.
She tours regularly with her group VOCO and has sung with leading vocal artists around the world, including Paul Hillier’s Theater of Voices, Ladysmith Black Mambazo, KITKA and New World Symphony. While studying piano performance and early music at Indiana University, Smiley was represented by IMG Artists Agency and toured nationally with her vocal group, VIDA. VIDA and (currently) VOCO have been featured at Lincoln Center, UCLA Live, Royal Festival Hall and music festivals across the U.S., Canada and Australia. Smiley is in high demand as a vocal clinician and receives commissions to write for vocal ensembles around the world.