Ken Ueno appeared with Joan Jeanrenaud at BAM last month. I missed the gig, but was excited to see the YouTube footage.
When I met Ken, in the graduate program at Boston University, he hadn’t yet started to sing; he was primarily a guitarist. Although he’s written a wide range of compositions, including Shiroi Ishi, a beautiful choral piece for the Hilliard Ensemble, in recent years he has carved out a distinctive identity as a throat-singer. Combining techniques from multiple traditions as well as some effects and ideas of his own, Ueno is now slugging it out toe to toe with Jeanrenaud!

You can hear more of Ken’s recent efforts, including a bunch of his throat-singing, on Talus, his disc for the BMOP/sound label.