As part of LIVE Biennale, Western Front is pleased to present Samra Mayanja’s Bone Deep Deliverance (SCREAM II). The performance is a continuation of an earlier sound work by the artist titled SCREAM, that was vocalised by a black experimental choir that the artist assembled in 2020.
Bone Deep Deliverance (SCREAM II) performatively and sonically explores engulfment, as in;
telling a joke
about a secret sky
that can’t be told otherwise.
Working within the sonic architecture of Mayanja’s vocal improvisations are two vocalists, Oluwasola Olowo-Ake and Oluwasayo Olowo-Ake, cellist Peggy Lee, and alto saxophonist Andromeda Monk.
Please see SCREAM I, the foundational text and music, written and composed by Mayanja. The piece was developed in Leeds and exhibited at MAMA, Rotterdam, with vocalists Banana and Orange, and pianist Rev Chunky.
Sound Design: Liza Violet and Samra Mayanja
Costume: Margaret Zawede
Dramaturgy: Malik Nashad Sharpe
Collaborators: Herfa Martina Thompson, Munesu Mukombe, Dee Byrne, and Meera Priyanka
Samra Mayanja is an artist and writer based in London, England whose work across various mediums is unified by an obsession with how life speaks poetry. Her work is always seeking form, to move beyond strictures, to be lost and free. The voice, in her work, functions as the search party for the body that she once forgot somewhere over there. Her desire to improvise; to create unfiltered, lucid, and meandering utterances, underpins her writing, pedagogy, performance, installation, and film works.
The Grand Luxe Hall is located on the second floor of Western Front, which is accessed by a flight of 26 stairs. A presentation of the performance will also be held on Oct, 13, 2023 at 6:00 p.m. in EDAM’s ground floor studio space that is accessible to wheelchair users, tickets for this performance are available here. Further details about accessibility at Western Front can be found here.
Presented in partnership with LIVE Biennale with support from the Government of Canada.