Who are we? Check out our brief welcome video to hear & learn more.
Described as “transformative” and “wildly innovative” by their audiences
Senso di Voce | Sense of Voice is:
Esin Gunduz, (vocalist/composer) | Megan Kyle (oboist).
Alana Adetola Arts Photography
Senso di Voce’s work is about resonances, physical and metaphorical. They build new compositions and improvisations around their interpretations of ancient and early music from Western and non-Western traditions. They illuminate connections of timbre, embodied sensation, and emotional impact in order to bridge apparent divides of history and geography, and to create a captivating emotional experience that they share joyfully with their audiences.
Composer Esin Gunduz had her works performed at the NonClassical UK, Banff Centre, and as part of the National Sawdust Digital Discovery Festival. Oboist Megan Kyle’s performance credits include the New York City Electroacoustic Music Festival and Chicago’s Preston Bradley Hall as well as the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra and Charleston Symphony Orchestra.
The ensemble has created projects for the “post-industrial cathedrals” of Silo City, a collection of monumental repurposed grain elevators in Buffalo, New York. During a residency at Avaloch Farm Music Institute in summer 2019 and in partnership with sound engineer Henry Birdsey, the duo used the reverb-profile of the silos to reimagine the project in a surround sound version for gallery spaces, a version that brings one acoustical space to life within another. More recently, they have performed at Hallwalls Contemporary Arts Center.
In August 2021, Senso di Voce was awarded a Classical Commissioning Grant* from Chamber Music America to commission a new piece by Esin Gunduz inspired by the philosophical writings of the Sufi mystic Ibn ‘Arabî.
In early February 2022, the duo presented a performance and talk in collaboration with the Memorial Art Gallery of the University of Rochester and in conversation with the special exhibition “Renaissance Impressions: Sixteenth-Century Master Prints from the Kirk Edward Long Collection,” which explores the emergence and transformative impact of the print medium on the visual culture of Renaissance Europe.
Recently, the duo has developed a six-speaker surround sound installation project called Sounding Spaces that reimagines their live performances in a soundscape form. Conceived as a moveable project that will morph and grow in dialogue with each new installation space, its first iteration was in the Handley Room in Buffalo for Play/Ground in August 2021. Its second, most recent, iteration was designed for Frontispace Gallery at the Art and Music Library at the University of Rochester, on exhibition from February 10 through March 3, 2022.
*This commission has been made possible by the Chamber Music America Classical Commissioning Program, with generous funding provided by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
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For composer, vocal performer, and improviser Esin Gunduz, sound originates in the body. She explores life’s energies as visceral sensory experience and sound, building landscapes of recorded-voice samples to surround acoustical instrumental textures, creating breathtaking acoustic vistas. Her works stemming from her research of traditional music and ancient texts are prominent, and they span diverse mediums like: acoustic, electroacoustic, or sound installation.
Dr Gunduz had her works performed as part of the Nonclassical and Music in the Round concert series (United Kingdom), Dark Music Days (Harpa Concert Hall, Iceland), National Sawdust Digital Discovery Festival (NyCity Usa), and at Banff Center (Canada). She was announced to be one of the Chamber Music America Classical Commissioning awardees in 2021 as a composer and the vocalist of the transformative oboe and voice duo: Senso di Voce.
Dr. Gunduz has been an adjunct voice professor at Villa Maria College and holds a PhD in music composition from Suny University at Buffalo. Originally from Istanbul (Turkey), she currently lives in New York State (Usa) and travels for her projects – esingunduz.com — esingunduz.com
Megan Kyle performs as a soloist, improviser, chamber musician, and orchestral musician, with a particular interest in resonances between early and recent music. She is fascinated by expressive extremes and unexpected acoustic phenomena on the oboe, experimenting with defamiliarizing or “glitching” the instrument through microtonality, multiphonics, timbral variation, and noise.
Megan performs and creates material with the new music ensemble Wooden Cities, oboe/piano/violin/cello quartet The Evolution of the Arm, and the musical research group Null Point. She performs as a substitute with the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, and Charleston Symphony Orchestra, and has appeared as a soloist at the New York Electroacoustic Music Festival. Megan teaches oboe and English horn at Houghton College, SUNY Geneseo, and SUNY at Buffalo and performs as a member of the Geneseo Wind Quintet.
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Senso di Voce thanks Jan and Barbara Jezioro for their annual support.
Senso di Voce 