Julianna Barwick

Composer, vocalist Juliana Barwick is an artist who works like a sonic sculptor in the way she takes voice recordings and molds them into ambient soundscapes through her loops, electronic effects, and keyboard layers. The result is an immersive and often profound acoustic experience. Her use of the reverb, electronic or otherwise, gives her pieces a deep cavernous quality, subtly transforming them into a meditation on space and the physical objects shaping it. The music has a repetitive core, but it also moves in waves, as she lets moments of tension punctuate its generally relaxing tone. Her work projects plenty of warmth built around melodically well-defined phrases that create an open-ended feel, as if it is part of an ongoing dialogue or a narrative thread.