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biography / portrait

Lift is a duo consisting of vocal stylists Randi Pontoppidan and Sissel Vera Pettersen. The two women came into contact with another around a common yearning to explore the multitude of timbral resources of the human voice and to engender a musical space without any recourse to any other musical instruments. Lift is an experimental, improvising and imaginative mini-ensemble that sets its sights on guiding the sound of the voice into sonic worlds that it has never penetrated before. The use of loop machines and the live manipulation of the voice contribute to the result that the sound landscapes vary from the entirely near and intimately acoustic to a world of ambient sound and polyrythmic beats. The duos repertoire consists of original compositions and free improvisation. Inspiration comes from many different streams of influence: pygmy-songs, yodling, joik, vocalise, human beat-box, Scandinavian hymns, jazz and the whole cache of everyday songs we have around us, which we might not always be listening to .... Lift invites the audience to plunge into the depths of the world of the human voice. (source: www.myspace.com/liftduo)