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press / biography |
photo: Yolanda Villegran
PRESS
"...conspicuously free-spirited and improvisation-fluent..." JAZZ TIMES
"..(Constables') wordless voice murmurs and snakes..." TIME OUT NEW YORK
"...delicately visceral ..." THE NEW YORK TIMES
“Constable's wordless vocalizing instils either a sense of harrowing urgency or a sublime sequence of musical events" ALL ABOUT JAZZ
"Using freely improvised lyrics delivered with a clear ringing tone, she phrases her flowing lines like an instrumentalist, using hints of electronics to process the sound... a delicate lyricism.." SIGNAL TO NOISE MAGAZINE
" Constable is a revelation...she sings a quiet line of wordless, atonal plainsong. Unfettered from the burden of a text, her voice becomes an abstract sound sculpture that is disquieting, compelling--and slightly unhinged." THE NEW REPUBLIC
".wavering multivalent sound..." OREGAN STUDENT INSURGENT
"Jessica Constable delivers stellar vocal energy" OUTLIER
"shimmering vocalizings" BAGATELLEN
"Jessica Constable, effectively breaks any hard-wired preconception of the voice's hierarchy within a musical framework ... Free of conventional singing limitations, Constable ... prefers to work within the dynamic of broken, juxtaposed syllables and abstraction .. unrestricted by the spoken word's explicit meaning, the listener is free to draw context and emotion that change with subsequent hearings and the listener's own mood" ALL ABOUT JAZZ.COM
"... ethereal poly-tonal vocalise..." JUNKMEDIA Magazine
photo: Aurore Vinot
"ses troublantes dérives vocales" JAZZ MAGAZINE
"une révélation" NOVA MAGAZINE
" Constable séduit immédiatement avec son ton éthéré, son chant-parlé qui a du style et du mystère" TRIP-HOP.NET
"Jessica Constable nous cueille" JAZZMAN
"la présence magnétique de Jessica Constable, qui chante déjà très bien... et fait en plus un excellent usage du chaos pad" CODA MAGAZINE
BIOGRAPHY
Jessica Constable -- who lives in Brittany, France -- has performed, composed and improvised in a wide variety of contexts and projects as leader, co-leader and soloist singer and/or side-person. She improvises extensively with stream-of-consciousness English lyrics, and has developed a repertory of songs also sung in English. Constable explores the details of sound and syllables; twisting harmonics, under- or over-pronouncing, leaning on or skimming over the relationships of sounds/words/intervals, and their function, sense, or emotional connotation.
Recent and/or ongoing projects include: solo performances, concerts and recordings with collaborator of the last 16 years, keyboardist Philippe Gelda (France), and with Andrea Parkins (USA) and with wave-editing composer/poet Christophe Guiraud/ Tellemake (France). She frequently tours with composer / tenor saxophonist Ellery Eskelin and his trio, including electronic accordionist/laptop artist Andrea Parkins and drummer Jim Black, and has also recorded two critically acclaimed CDs with the band: Ten -- also featuring guest artists Marc Ribot (guitar) and Melvin Gibbs (electric bass), and Quiet Music featuring Philippe Gelda (keyboards, vocal).
She has made two CDs with The Flow (U.K.) and plays with French jazz patriarch Francois Jeanneau's Pandemonium big band. In recent years she has played for theatre, and for choreographers Patricia Ferrara and Pascal Delhay; performed and recorded with Jeff Sharel, Jean-Phi Dary , and Soulreactive (all of France) as well as performing Anahit Simonian’s concerto for voice, doudouk (Araik Bahtakian) and symphonic orchestra, conducted by Alexander Sladkovsky at The Hermitage, St Petersburg, Russia.
photo: Yolanda VIllegran
