The Sound Voice Project

A unique performance installation exploring powerful stories of voice loss and identity through surround-sound, audio-visual, and settings of three works from the Sound Voice Project, featuring Lucy Crowe and Roderick Williams. Luke Halls Studio collaborated with Sound Voice to create projections for 2 of the project's pieces. Tanja Tanja is 39 years old and was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer growing behind her vocal cords in 2020. One week after diagnosis her voice box was removed during the Covid Pandemic. This piece charts her journey recovering from life changing surgery complicated by social distancing and isolation. Having trained initially as a professional actor/singer she is exploring how voice loss impacts her daily life as mother of two young children, her relationships, identity at the school gates and the stigmas attached to being a woman with a laryngectomy. The piece is for Tanja and professional soprano. I Left My Voice Behind I Left My Voice Behind explores how the voice links us to our past, present and future identities, including vocal potential enabled by science and technology. It was written in collaboration with people who have survived throat cancer and have had life-saving laryngectomy treatment to remove their voice box, alongside healthcare professionals, and a team of biomedical researchers developing a ground breaking implantable larynx. The piece is written for two choirs: one live choir (performed by people who have had laryngectomies, members of Shout at Cancer) and a second digital choir, constructed from recordings of Shout at Cancer members pre-cancer, when their voice boxes were still intact. The choirs are joined by solo professional cello, with a digital counterpart crafted from old recordings of that cellist, mirroring the duet between live and digital choirs and collectively exploring renewal, transformation, and the birth of new vocal identities.