Laurie Anderson

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Biography

Laura Phillips "Laurie" Anderson (born 5 June 1947) is an American experimental performance art ist, composer and musician who plays violin and keyboards and sings in a variety of experimental music and art rock styles. Initially trained as a sculpt or,Amirkhanian, Charles. . Liner note essay. New World Records . Anderson did her first performance-art piece in the late 1960s. Throughout the 1970s, Anderson did a variety of different performance-art activities. She became widely known outside the art world in 1981 when her single " O Superman " reached number two on the UK pop charts. She also starred in and directed the 1986 concert film Home of the Brave (1986 film)|Home of the Brave .

Anderson is a pioneer in electronic music and has invented several devices that she has used in her recordings and performance art shows. In 1977, she created a tape-bow violin that uses recorded magnetic tape on the bow instead of horsehair and a magnetic tape head in the bridge. In the late 1990s, she developed a talking stick, a six-foot-long baton-like MIDI controller that can access and replicate different sounds.

Anderson married singer/songwriter and guitarist Lou Reed in 2008.

Early life

Anderson was born in Glen Ellyn, Illinois|Glen Ellyn , Illinois , the daughter of Mary Louise (née Rowland) and Arthur T. Anderson. She graduated from Glenbard West High School . She attended Mills College in California , and eventually graduated from Barnard College magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa , studying art history . In 1972, she obtained an MFA in sculpture from Columbia University . Her first performance-art piece—a symphony played on automobile horns—was performed in 1969. In 1970, she drew the underground comix Baloney Moccasins, which was published by George DiCaprio . In the early 1970s, she worked as an art instructor, as an art critic for magazines such as Artforum , and illustrated children's books - the first of which was entitled The Package , a mystery story in pictures alone.

1970s

She performed in New York through the 1970s. One of her most-cited performances, Duets on Ice , which she conducted in New York and other cities around the world, involved her playing the violin along with a recording while wearing ice skates with the blades frozen into a block of ice; the performance ended only when the ice had melted away. Two early pieces, "New York Social Life" and "Time to Go," were included in the 1977 compilation New Music for Electronic and Recorded Media , along with works by Pauline Oliveros and others. Two other pieces were included on Airwaves a collection of audio pieces by artists. She also recorded a lecture for Vision , a set of artist's lectures released by Crown Point Press as a set of 6 LPs.

Many of Anderson's earliest recordings remain unreleased, or were only issued in limited quantities, such as her first single, "It's Not the Bullet that Kills You (It's the Hole)". That song, along with "New York Social Life" and about a dozen others, were originally recorded for use in an art installation that consisted of a jukebox that played the different Anderson compositions, at the Holly Solomon Gallery in New York City. Among the musicians on these early recordings are Peter Gordon (composer)|Peter Gordon on saxophone, Scott Johnson on guitar, Ken Deifik on harmonica, and Joe Kos on drums. Photographs and descriptions of many of these early performances were included in Anderson's retrospective book, Stories from the Nerve Bible .

During the late 1970s, Anderson made a number of additional recordings that were released either privately or included on compilations of avant-garde music, most notably releases by the Giorno Poetry Systems label run by New York poet John Giorno , an early intimate of Andy Warhol . Among the Giorno-released recordings was '' You're the Guy I Want to Share My Money With '', a double-album shared with Giorno and William Burroughs (the original release had one LP side for each artist, with the fourth side triple-grooved, one for each, so you'd get a different one, depending on where you put the needle down). In 1978, Anderson performed at The Nova Convention, a major conference involving many counter-culture figures and rising avant-garde musical stars, including William S. Burroughs , Philip Glass , Frank Zappa , Timothy Leary , Malcolm Goldstein , John Cage , and Allen Ginsberg . She also worked with comedian Andy Kaufman in the late 1970s.Laurie Anderson, Stories from the Nerve Bible .

1980s

Anderson became widely known outside the art world in 1981 with the single " O Superman ", originally released in a limited quantity by B. George 's One Ten Records . The song reached number two on the national pop charts in Britain after the sudden influx of orders from the UK (prompted by British radio station Radio Clyde playlisting the record) and led to Anderson's signing a 7-album deal with Warner Bros. Records , which re-released the single.

"O Superman" was part of a larger stage work titled United States (Anderson)|United States and was included on the album Big Science (album)|Big Science . Prior to the release of Big Science , Anderson returned to Giorno Poetry Systems to record the album '' You're the Guy I Want to Share My Money With ; Anderson recorded one side of the 2-LP set, with William S. Burroughs and John Giorno recording a side each, and the fourth side featured a separate groove for each artist. This was followed by the back-to-back releases of her albums Mister Heartbreak and United States Live '', the latter of which was a five-LP (and, later, 4-CD) recording of her 2-evening stage show at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. She also appeared in a television special produced by Nam June Paik broadcast on New Years Day 1984, entitled Good Morning Mr. Orwell (the title being inspired by Orwell's novel 1984).

She next starred in and directed the 1986 concert film Home of the Brave (1986 film)|Home of the Brave and also composed the soundtracks for the Spalding Gray films Swimming to Cambodia and Monster in a Box . During this time she also contributed music to Robert Wilson's " Alcestis " at the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She also hosted the Public Broadcasting Service|PBS series Alive from Off-Center during this time, for which she produced the short film What You Mean We? Release of Anderson's first post- Home of the Brave album, 1989's Strange Angels (Laurie Anderson album)|Strange Angels , was delayed for more than a year in order for Anderson to take singing lessons. This was due to the album being more musically inclined (in terms of singing) than her previous works.

1990s

In 1991, she was a member of the jury at the 41st Berlin International Film Festival . In the same year, Anderson appeared in The Human Face , a feature arts documentary directed by artist-filmmakers Nichola Bruce and Michael Coulson (director and producer)|Michael Coulson for BBC TV. Anderson was the presenter in this documentary on the history of the face in art and science. Her face was transformed using latex masks and digital special effects as she introduced ideas about the relationship between physiognomy and perception. Her varied career in the early 1990s included voice-acting in the animated film The Rugrats Movie . In 1994 she created a CD-ROM titled Puppet Motel , which was followed by Bright Red , co-produced by Brian Eno , and another spoken-word album, The Ugly One with the Jewels . This was then followed by an appearance on the 1997 charity single Perfect Day (Lou Reed song)|Perfect Day .

In 1996, Anderson performed with Diego Frenkel (La Portuária) and Aterciopelados for the AIDS benefit album Silencio=Muerte: Red Hot + Latin produced by the Red Hot Organization .

An interval of more than half a decade followed before her next album release. During this time, she wrote a supplemental article on the cultural character of New York City for the Encyclopædia Britannica "Encyclopaedia Anderson", The New Yorker , July 16, 2001 and created a number of multimedia presentations, most notably one inspired by Moby-Dick ( Songs and Stories From Moby Dick , 1999–2000). One of the central themes in Anderson's work is exploring the effects of technology on human relationships and communication.

2000s

Life on a String (album)|Life on a String , appeared in 2001, by which time she signed a new contract with another Warner Music label, Nonesuch Records . Life on a String was a mixture of new works (including one song recalling the recent death of her father) and works from the Moby Dick presentation. In 2001, she recorded the audiobook version of Don DeLillo 's novel The Body Artist . Anderson, who rarely revisits older work (though themes and lyrics occasionally reappear), went on tour performing a selection of her best-known musical pieces in 2001. One of these performances was recorded in New York City only a week after the September 11, 2001, attacks , and included a performance of "O Superman." This concert was released in early 2002 as the double CD Live in New York .

In 2003, Anderson became NASA 's first artist-in-residence, which inspired her performance piece, The End of the Moon . She mounted a succession of themed shows and composed a piece for Expo 2005 in Japan. In 2005, Anderson visited Russia’s space programme – the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Centre and mission control – with Arts Catalyst|The Arts Catalyst and took part in Arts Catalyst|The Arts Catalyst ’s Space Soon event at the Roundhouse to reflect on her experiences. She was part of the team that created the opening ceremony for the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens. Later that year, she collaborated with the choreographer Trisha Brown and filmmaker Agnieszka Wojtowicz-Vosloo on the acclaimed multimedia project O Zlozony/O Composite for the Paris Opera Ballet . The ballet premiered at the Opera Garnier in Paris in December 2004. Anderson has also collaborated with William S. Burroughs , Jean Dupuy (artist)|Jean Dupuy , Arto Lindsay , Bill Laswell , Ian Ritchie (producer)|Ian Ritchie , Peter Gabriel , Perry Hoberman , David Sylvian , Jean Michel Jarre , Brian Eno , Phillip Glass , Nona Hendryx , Bobby McFerrin , Ryuichi Sakamoto , David A. Stewart|Dave Stewart , Peter Gordon (composer)|Peter Gordon , Adrian Belew , Hector Zazou , and Lou Reed .

Since the latter part of the 1990s Anderson and Lou Reed have collaborated on a number of recordings together. Anderson contributed to "Call on Me" from Reed's collaborative project The Raven (Lou Reed album)|The Raven , on the tracks "Rouge" and "Rock Minuet" from Reed's Ecstasy (Lou Reed album)|Ecstasy , and "Hang on to Your Emotions" from Reed's Set the Twilight Reeling ; Lou Reed contributes to the tracks "In Our Sleep" from Laurie Anderson's Bright Red and "One Beautiful Evening" from Anderson's Life on a String (album)|Life on a String . They were married on April 12, 2008 in a private ceremony in Boulder, Colorado ., BBC Radio 6 Music (bbc.co.uk), May 1, 2008 (accessed May 6, 2008)

In 2005, her exhibition The Waters Reglitterized opened at the Sean Kelly Gallery in New York City. According to the press release by Sean Kelly, Laurieanderson.com Retrieved on 05-09-07 the work is a diary of dreams and their literal recreation as works of art. This work, created in the process of re-experiencing or re-working her dreams while awake, uses the language of dreams to investigate the dream itself. The resulting pieces include drawings, prints, and high-definition video. The installation ran until October 22, 2005. In 2006, she contributed a song to Plague Songs , a collection of songs related to the 10 Biblical plagues.

Laurie Anderson narrated Ric Burns 's Andy Warhol: A Documentary Film , which was first televised in September 2006 as part of the PBS American Masters series. Anderson also performed in Came So Far for Beauty , the Leonard Cohen tribute event held in the Point Theatre, Dublin, Ireland, on October 4–5, 2006. Recent releases include a re-release of her first album, Big Science (album)|Big Science on Nonesuch Records , a book of drawings titled Night Life , and a brand new album released in 2010 called Homeland (Laurie Anderson album)|Homeland .

Material from Homeland was performed at small work-in-progress shows in New York throughout May 2007, most notably at the Highline Ballroom on May 17–18, supported by a 4-piece band with spontaneous lighting and video visuals mixed live throughout the performances by Willie Williams (lighting designer)|Willie Williams and Mark Coniglio , respectively. A European tour of the Homeland work in progress took place during the late summer and fall of 2007, including performances on September 28 and September 29, 2007, at the Olympia Theatre, Dublin; on October 17–19 at the Melbourne International Arts Festival; in Russia at the Moscow Dom Muzyky concert-hall on April 26, 2008. The work was performed across the Atlantic in Toronto, Canada, June 14, 2008, with husband Lou Reed , making the "Lost Art of Conversation" a duet with vocals and guitar, with his ambling style contrasting with Anderson's tightly wound performance. Anderson's Homeland Tour performed at several locations across the United States as well, such as at the Ferst Center for the Arts , Atlanta, Georgia; The Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts , New York, New York; and Harris Theater for Music and Dance in Millennium Park , Chicago, Illinois, co-presented by the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago .

Anderson was awarded the 2007 Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize|Gish Prize for her "outstanding contribution to the beauty of the world and to humankind’s enjoyment and understanding of life."

2010s

In February 2010, Laurie Anderson premiered a new theatrical work, entitled Delusion , at the 2010 Winter Olympics|Vancouver 2010 Olympic Games . This piece was commissioned by the Vancouver 2010 Cultural Olympiad and the Barbican Centre, London.

In May/June 2010, Anderson curated the Vivid Sydney festival in Sydney, Australia together with Lou Reed. http://vividsydney.com/events/vivid-live Her new album Homeland (Laurie Anderson album)|Homeland was released on June 22.

She performed "Only an Expert" on July 15, 2010 on The Late Show with David Letterman , and her song "Gravity's Angel" was featured on the Fox TV show So You Think You Can Dance (U.S. TV series)|So You Think You Can Dance on the same day.

She appears as a guest musician on several tracks from experimental jazz musician Colin Stetson 's 2011 album New History Warfare Vol. 2: Judges .

Anderson is currently developing a new theatrical work, entitled "Another Day in America". The first public showings of this work-in-progress will take place in Calgary, Alberta in January, 2011 as part of 's 2011-12 season and One Yellow Rabbit 's annual arts festival, the High Performance Rodeo.

Inventions

Anderson has invented several experimental musical instrument s that she has used in her recordings and performances.

Tape-bow violin

The tape-bow violin is an instrument created by Laurie Anderson in 1977. It uses recorded magnetic tape in place of the traditional horsehair in the bow, and a magnetic tape head in the bridge. Anderson has updated and modified this device over the years.

She can be seen using a later generation of this device in her film Home of the Brave during the "Late Show" segment in which she manipulates a sentence recorded by William S. Burroughs. This version of the violin discarded magnetic tape and instead used MIDI-based audio samples, triggered by contact with the bow.

Talking stick

The talking stick is a 6-foot-long baton-like MIDI controller. It was used in the Moby-Dick tour in 1999–2000. She described it in program notes as follows:

Voice filters

A recurring motif in Anderson's work is the use of a voice filter which deepens her voice into a masculinity|masculine register, a technique which Anderson has referred to as "audio drag (clothing)|drag ".. 2010 Winter Olympics Cultural Olympiad, February 5, 2010. Anderson has long used the resulting character in her work as a "voice of authority " or conscience , although she later decided that he had lost much of his authority and instead began utilizing the voice to provide historical or sociopolitical commentary,. CBC News , February 16, 2010. as he does on "Another Day in America", a piece from her 2010 album Homeland (Laurie Anderson album)|Homeland .

For much of Anderson's career, the character was nameless or actually called the Voice of Authority, although more recently, he was dubbed Fenway Bergamot from Reed's suggestion. The cover of Homeland depicts Anderson in character as Bergamot, with streaks of black makeup to give her a moustache and thick, masculine eyebrows.

In "The Cultural Ambassador", a piece on her album The Ugly One with the Jewels , Anderson explained some of her perspective on the character:

Discography

(with US and UK chart positions)

Studio albums

Big Science (album)|Big Science (1982) US #124 UK Albums Chart|UK #29

Mister Heartbreak (1984) US #60 UK #93

Home of the Brave (soundtrack)|Home of the Brave (soundtrack album) (1986) US #145

Strange Angels (Laurie Anderson album)|Strange Angels (1989) US #171, featuring Bobby McFerrin

Bright Red (1994) US #195

The Ugly One with the Jewels ( spoken word ) (1995)

Life on a String (album)|Life on a String (2001)

Homeland (Laurie Anderson album)|Homeland (2010)

Live albums

United States Live (boxed set) (1984) US #192

Live in New York (Laurie Anderson)|Live in New York (2002)

Compilation albums

Talk Normal: The Laurie Anderson Anthology (2000)

Collaborations

'' You're the Guy I Want To Share My Money With (1981) (with William S. Burroughs , John Giorno )

This is the Picture (Excellent Birds) , with Peter Gabriel , 1986

The Stone: Issue Three (by John Zorn , Lou Reed & Laurie Anderson (performance artist)|Laurie Anderson , recorded live in 2008)

Zoolook (by Jean Michel Jarre , recorded in 1984)

Silencio=Muerte: Red Hot + Latin , song "Una Hoja, Una Raiz" (Compilation album, 1997, with Diego Frenkel (La Portuária) and Aterciopelados )

Métamorphoses (by Jean Michel Jarre , recorded in 2000)

Plague Songs , song "The Death of Livestock" (Compilation album, 2006)

Verde, anil, amarelo, cor de rosa e carvão (Rose & Charcoal) , song "Enquanto Isso" (with Marisa Monte , 1994)

New History Warfare Vol. 2: Judges (2011) by Colin Stetson

Singles

" O Superman " (1981) #2 UK Singles Chart|UK

"Big Science" (1981)

"Sharkey's Day" (1984)

"Language Is a Virus" (1986)

"Strange Angels" (1989)

"Babydoll" (1989) #7 US Modern Rock

"Beautiful Red Dress" (1990)

"In Our Sleep" (1994)

"Big Science 2" (2007) (Currently available only on iTunes)

"Mambo and Bling" (2008)

"Only an Expert" (2010)

The single "Sharkey's Day" was for many years the theme song of Lifetime Television . Anderson also recorded a number of limited-release singles in the late 1970s (many issued from the Holly Soloman Gallery ), songs from which were included on a number of compilations, including Giorno Poetry Systems ' The Nova Convention and ''You're the Guy I Want to Share My Money With . Over the years she has also performed on recordings by other musicians such as Peter Gabriel , Lou Reed , and Jean Michel Jarre . She also contributed lyrics to the Philip Glass album Songs for Liquid Days , she also contributed a spoken-word piece to a tribute album in honor of John Cage .

Music videos

Formal music videos have been produced of

"O Superman"

"Sharkey's Day"

"Language is a Virus" (from Home of the Brave )

"Beautiful Red Dress"

In addition, in lieu of making another music video for her Strange Angels album, Anderson taped a series of 1- to 2-minute "Personal Service Announcements" in which she spoke about issues such as the U.S. national debt and the arts scene. Some of the music used in these productions came from her soundtrack of Swimming to Cambodia . The PSAs were frequently shown between music videos on VH-1 in early 1990.

Films

# Dearreader: How to Turn a Book Into a Movie - 1974
# System ohne Schatten/Closed Circuit - 1983
# Home of the Brave (1986 film)|Home of the Brave: A Film by Laurie Anderson - 1986
# What You Mean We? - 1987
# Hotel Deutschland - 1992
# The Rugrats Movie - 1998 (provided character voice)
# Life on a String - 2002
# Hidden Inside Mountains - 2006

Television

# Saturday Night Live - musical guest, 1986 # Alive from Off Center - host, 1987

Audiobooks

# The Path to Tranquility by His Holiness the Dalai Lama - co-narrator, 1999
# The Body Artist by Don DeLillo - sole narrator, 2001

Bibliography

United States ( HarperCollins , 1984) ISBN 0-06-091110-7

Stories from the Nerve Bible: A Twenty-Year Retrospective ( HarperCollins , 1994) ISBN 0-06-055355-3

Dal Vivo (Fondazione Prada, 1999) ISBN 88-87029-10-5

Night Life (Edition 7L, 2007) ISBN 3-86521-339-1

Copyright Citations

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