Strange, spellbinding virtuosity from Theatre of Voices

From The Telegraph, 13 February 2022

'Saturday night’s concert from the Theatre of Voices, a Danish vocal quartet led by English baritone Paul Hillier, made full use of all those attributes. It was part of the year-long Voices Unwrapped series at Kings Place in London, which offers a bird’s-eye view of the extraordinary range of the world’s vocal music. The Theatre of Voices inhabits a small, little-known corner of this vast world that used to go by the name of “extended vocal techniques”, and the music has a special power to stimulate the imagination. It’s hard not to picture a scene when you hear a singer’s voice transform from pure note to watery sound.

So, this group has an apt name, and it performs with spell-binding virtuosity. In Song by the Danish composer Pelle Gudmundsen-Holmgreen, I had to marvel at the way the vocalists soared and swooped and then hit a complex chord out of the blue with complete accuracy. It seemed as miraculous as a homing pigeon’s arrival...'