Meredith Monk

Composers Datebook

Synopsis

American composer, singer, dancer and choreographer Meredith Monk was born in New York City on today’s date in 1942.

Monk attended Sarah Lawrence College, where she studied theatre, dance and music. After graduating in 1964, she began performing pieces that combined gesture and movement with vocal and visual elements. Around that time, a number of contemporary composers had begun stretching the boundaries of instrumental music, but, as she recalls, there wasn’t much happening regarding extended vocal techniques.

Monk began testing how she could stretch the range, timbre and character of her own singing, inventing a vocabulary based on her particular voice — as she explains it, just as a dancer would develop a vocabulary of movement particular to their body.

Considering her long-standing interest in integrating music with movement and visuals, opera seemed a natural outlet for Monk’s talents, and in 1993 she premiered a full-length opera, Atlas.

Atlas was inspired by the life of Alexandra David-Neel, a scientist who was the first Western woman to travel in Tibet. It seemed a natural choice for Monk, for whom exploration and curiosity are so important. “If I knew what I was looking for, it wouldn’t be that interesting,” she said.

Music Played in Today's Program

Meredith Monk (b. 1942): Atlas; Meredith Monk Ensemble; Wayne Hankin, conductor; ECM 1491