Audrey Chen, Beam Splitter, Henrik Munkeby Nørstebø

Beam Splitter (Audrey Chen and Henrik Munkeby Nørstebø) is a duo for amplified voice and trombone. Beam Splitter‘s debut album Rough Tongue on Corvo Records is one part, a timbral collage of carefully extracted sound material and in another, a longer moment taken from an intimate room below the din. All tracks are taken from three live concerts in 2016. Utilizing the pure sounds of acoustic and closely amplified trombone and voice, the record exemplifies the joining together of these two individual voices into a distinct dialog that delves beyond the borders of the corporeal elements of extended technique and sound. There is an intimacy and conflict that becomes evident as the two personas intertwine, in moments joining together seamlessly and in the next, being left with the feeling of irrevocable fracture. The two manage between these extremes with a kind of improvised grace that reveals an effort towards a common goal. It is an honest metaphor for human relationship in process that even in the most serene moments can leave one raw and entirely exposed. Since beginning their collaboration in 2015, Nørstebø and Chen have been extensively touring the globe, in Europe, New Zealand, Argentina, Brazil, Taiwan and the USA. They have presented their music in a wide variety of spaces, taken part in larger commissioned works at the Teatro Colon, Buenos Aires and largely conceptualized a theatrical adaptation of MEDEA in front of the Olympic Stadium in Kiev, Ukraine (for butoh dancers and musicians) produced by the Ukho Agency. They have shared their collaborative projects with artists such as Phil Minton, Bob Ostertag, Michael Vorfeld, Thomas Rohrer, Valentin Tszin, Flavia Ghisalberti and Leonel Kaplan.