Murder Ballads : Volumes 1 & 2.
Murder ballads are a small sub-set of the American country/folk music tradition whose lyrics describe the details of a real life violence. Originating in England and Scotland in the 18th century, American Murder Ballads developed their own method of story-telling, focusing on real events and using the song format as a performative tabloid, depicting in gruesome details the methods and outcomes of authentic murderous acts.
This project looks at story-telling and musical forms in American Murder Ballads which bind women to a helpless victim-stereotype, and ask audiences to stare straight into their own fascination with dramatized violence and true-crime. The song-cycle will re-construct these ballads to embolden women to enact their rightful autonomy. The lyrics and underlying musical structures of seven traditional American Murder Ballads will be re-set by the American composer Jessie Marino. These re- composed songs will feature female voices, always singing in unison or tightly bound harmonies (a musical and performative display of female solidarity), and an experimental slurry of improvised and composed electro-acoustic music. This is a project aimed to give women control of the narratives which once incited a detached view of the violence they experience, and uses language’s ability to be re-written to further explore and define our reality as it may be seen in the moment of its performance.
Volume 2: The Positive Reinforcement Campaign
*commissioned by Donaueschingen Musik Tage, with support from Ultima Festival NO and SPOR Festival DK
Sometimes, it is only possible to grapple with the news of great devastation when that news is encased in the softness of a song.
This song cycle of murder ballads, “The Positive Reinforcement Campaign” weaves together improvised experimental soundscapes, traditional Sacred Harp hymns, and Appalachian folk ballads as we sing the tales of precious entities, be they human or environmental, which are subjected to the brutality of contempt, greed, jealousy, and utter disregard.
These songs are the results of an intimate and direct collaboration between composer/performer Jessie Marino with four Norwegian musicians, the trio Pinquins (Jennifer Torrence, Sigrun Rogstad Gomnæs and Ane Marthe Sørlien Holen) and Inga Margrete Aas. Through improvisation, experimentation and group singing “The Positive Reinforcement Campaign” has banded together to reimagine and reconfigure the vessels of these traditional songs - populating them with their own sonic languages and reflecting on the horrific stories of our current time.
Pinquins : Ane Marthe Sørlien Holen, voice, keyboards, electronics, Jennifer Torrence, voice, percussion, Sigrun Rogstad Gomnæs - voices, percussion
Inga Margarete Aas : voice, double bass, Jessie Marino : voice, fiddle, electronics
Emilia Dorr : Tennis Player
“The murder ballads witness Appalachia, specifically in the 19th century period of industrial change, was defined by essential tensions between cultural traditions of the past and emerging notions of American modernism. This tension is met in the songs with responses of violence against women whole life situations - marked by sexual freedom - are the very depiction of a new cultural modernism that threatens the hegemony of the past.” Christina Ruth Hastle: “This Murder Done”: Misogyny, Femicide, and Modernity in 19th Century Appalachian Murder Ballads
“Many of the human figures on the death card, cling to whatever is at hand. To clutch at the familiar and safe in the face of danger is second nature, even when such panic and fear induced desperation contributes to pain and ruination, as when a drowning man pulls down with him anyone who tries to help. Humanities great success is its ability to assess and make the changes necessary to evade peril. Yet ironically, humanity is so loath to change, it does everything in its power to keep things as they are, regardless of how outmoded or detrimental. This dichotomy is one of the primary illnesses of modern man. As Jung said ‘ Shrinking away from death is something unhealthy and abnormal which robs the second half of life of its purpose.’ Man is anxious, to be sure, but the only sure thing in life is death, just as sure as surety itself is death. But the death card entreats the Querent to embrace letting go /
Death is interlaced with life itself…. there is no unsticking the one from the other, as death and life are the two cycles of the two stroke motor of existence.”
-The Gnostic Tarot/ J.F. Martel & Phil Ford- ‘Weird Studies’ Episode 138.
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a gathering-
before boarding the ship.
how long are we able to stay afloat?
Remember how the sound fell from her lips?
Witness! The vanquishing of her voice.
from the ship-
in the distance, a bridge
two heartbeats standing
steer the bow to nestle under her steely curve
Witness! The heartbeats return to liquid shadow.
alighting from cresting wave to blistered shore-
three sisters discover their magic
in a basin full of feather and blood-
tapped from their own blue veins.
Witness! The fellness of the abductor
Lights up!
Down girl, down
Don’t sweat!
Stay Down!
Oh boy -
Witness! The defiant bawl of our exasperation.
our mother pleads with a fateful comet
cosmic, speeding, succoring rock
One fell swoop
Witness! The steady and ominous trot of our final paces-
Here comes hell and high water.
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This work contains stories of physical violence, suicide, and child death.
Please take care while listening.
Volume 1: Sister Sister
for Aperture Duo - Premiered August 22,2023 Los Angeles, CA
*commissioned by Fromm Foundation -