Chamber opera composer and singer, Jane Sheldon, goes big on flowermuscle, yet every measure is hushed enough to capture a whisper. Using Rainer Maria Rilke’s poetry, she explores the corners of a sonic space that feels both powerful and delicate, unfolding his words as sound expands in many directions all at once.
Sheldon’s last album I am a tree, I am a mouth was also a portrayal of Rilke’s poems. However, despite the restrained color palette of that album, flowermuscle’s songs explore a more colorful and diverse atmosphere.
The first single off Jane Sheldon’s upcoming album, flowermuscle, crafts a sonic soundscape both grand and delicate. Showcasing Sheldon’s talent without restraint, “The double realm” transforms the poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke, captivating and guiding the listener through meditative vocals. Sheldon is inspired and interested by the visceral experience of vast altered states, and she succeeds in producing a lush and transcendental exploration of such consciousness. The track layers synths and vocals upon one another until the listener is enveloped into a vibrating web of possibility, blooming with a rhythmic gentleness and an unmistaken power.
Photo by Olivia Davies
I am a tree, I am a mouth gently filled space within Rilke’s words. Flowermuscle dares to stretch that space–unfolding it into a bolder, stranger, and more vibrant statement. Her new album doesn’t just echo Rilke’s poetry, but reimagines it, fabulating a dreamy world of lush melodies and spellbinding vocals.
Says Sheldon:
I felt with the last one that holding back was the natural response to what he wrote," Sheldon says about her previous project. "We realized early on with this new album that we didn’t want to play it safe this time and needed to push things, broaden the sonic palette in certain ways. I’m most interested in the felt experience of altered states: I am a tree… lived in the privacy of those experiences, but flowermuscle is much more about their vastness, about the possibility of feeling that you’re in erotic resonance with everything else in nature.