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Stories   >   VOCES8 release new album; 'Infinity.' Barnaby Smith and Katie Jeffries-Harris chat with Winnipeg's CLASSIC 107

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VOCES8 release new album; 'Infinity.' Barnaby Smith and Katie Jeffries-Harris chat with Winnipeg's CLASSIC 107

Posted: August 27, 2021

VOCES8 is sure to wow fans again with their latest album. (Facebook)

Winnipeg's CLASSIC 107 - Chris Wolf writes.....The English eight-part acapella choir VOCES8 has been amazing audiences around the world with the sheer beauty that the ensemble creates. Picture a choir that has flawless intonation, perfect vocal balance, and where each one of the individual singers is a supreme musician… this is VOCES8 in a nutshell.

The group releases their latest recording called Infinity, on August 27 TODAY!!!. The album consists of new music from 21st-century composers from a wide range of musical backgrounds. Video game, film and alternative composers are all represented on this disc.

The album was recorded early on in the pandemic says Artistic Director and countertenor for VOCES8, Barnaby Smith.

As First Alto for VOCES8  Katie Jeffries-Harris says, "It was a huge relief to be recording it through the pandemic… to have this time to work with each other and have an artistic output, I think has been really interesting."

Smith credits the diverse program of the disc to people behind the scenes. As Smith states, "A lot of the credit has to go to our wonderful Executive Producer Helen at Decca Records…our record label really did a lot of research into the sorts of composers that might intrigue multigenerational listeners, but also composers who are writing in a style that might translate very well into the sorts of sounds and noises that we make as a group."

The album Infinity is based on the idea of space, both literally and figuratively. "It's the idea of kind of getting beyond the mundane…so really finding a space that is quite meditative…maybe that's something religious, maybe it's just getting away and calming yourself from what has been a really difficult 18 months or so," Jeffries-Harris says.

Smith describes the sound of the album as "the sort of sound I think people enjoy hearing VOCES8 make on disc…the sort of CD that they can turn to in various different times of the day, for various different reasons but that they will enjoy having on."

On the literal end of things, there is a track on the disc that makes use of sounds from the Sputnik satellite. Nainita Desai's piece "My Mind is Still" makes use of sounds from the satellite, and combines them with the heavenly sounds of VOCES8.

There are six brand new tracks on the album that have been arranged for VOCES8. "The arrangements are done by a few different people because a number of the tracks on the album are in their original form very successful, and we've taken them and made them work for eight voices possibly plus an instrument," Smith says. "It's quite important to us when we do these projects that these arrangements are bespoke because taking the original tracks and converting to voices in this way is a very difficult thing...so we work in collaboration with the arrangers to make sure it fits just right."

And fit just right they do! VOCES8 has succeeded in creating an album that will both calm you and be a feast for your ears. All of the tracks are spellbinding and show that VOCES8 can do it all.  The harmonies on the disc are at times complex and interesting, but with VOCES8's supreme musicianship, they come across as nothing but sheer beauty.

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