Jody Pou

Jody Pou is an American poet and visual artist who has lived in and out of France for many years. She is also an accomplished lyric soloist whose career has focused primarily on Baroque and Contemporary music. She has premiered many pieces, sung with many ensembles and in many festivals throughout Europe and in the US since her two first prizes at the Paris Conservatory. She has won multiple prizes in international singing competitions. In 2007, she sung the soprano role in a staged production of Ligeti’s Aventures et Nouvelles Aventures at the Paris Opera. The same year in New York City, she created the label Shsk’h, commissioning pieces by a diverse array of musicians and composers, including Garth Knox, Etsuko Chida, and Igor Ballereau. It is here that one can find her interpretation of all of Webern opuses of piano with voice, as well as a volume of Baroque songs and Jazz standards.

Her books, Will (Les Petits Matins, Paris, 2009) and I thought j’irais en bloom (Le Bleu du Ciel, Bordeaux, 2014) are both written in English and French, mixed. Other texts have been published in various journals, notably Tilt, with audio on quaderna.org. She is featured in the Migrant Women’s Poetry anthology, published in 2017 in Japan. In 2018, she founded WORK with Ethan Segal and Alex Ledsom, a startup focused on making workers’ lives better in the US. She is also an autodidactic painter and sculptor, and she performs her multidisciplinary texts regularly in various festivals and galleries.

Listen to : O Solitude, Henry Purcell Jody Pou, voice; Thomas Dunford, archilute

Listen to Briefe an F, by Igor Ballereau

The Something Songs are songs that Jody writes during her lunch break pause to help her change her brain’s focus. They are written with loops in mind, recorded on an Ipad and sent into the ether, in this case : Soundcloud. They have been performed in festivals and galleries live, most recently at the Festival Actoral, Marseille.
They are written from a phrase that might have caught my attention in a book I am currently reading, or from a philosopher that I like.
Here is the very first Something Song :

Wittgenstein

Something Song :

Judith Butler

Listen to : Canzonetta Spirituale Sopra alla Nanna, Tarquinio Merula, voice Jody Pou, archilute Thomas Dunford

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