Medicine Truck
Space 101.1fm LIVE Radio Dharma Daily Interview
Concert with Medicine Truck !
Medicine Truck is sometimes poignant, at times deeply moving & often hilarious, as each song is a true original & completely unrehearsed!
CONCERT: Medicine Truck is the Pacific Northwest’s premier a cappella vocal improvisation trio, and a collision of creative genius! Debby Boland Watt, Christian Swenson and Travis Johnson take their singing seriously, knowing that sound is for the sculpting. These three incredible vocalists will expand what you know about a cappella music, passing you on the turns, running over what ails you and then flooring it when you think they just gotta be outta gas! Medicine Truck invites you to wonder, laugh, and then join them.
"Medicine Truck is sometimes poignant, at times deeply moving and often hilarious, as each song is a true original and completely unrehearsed. Truck'in with Christian and Travis has been a marvelous trip." (Debby)
“Singing with Debby and Travis is like having your cake and eating it too! I love their fearlessness, and I’ve never had such good company as down in the deep end with Travis and then off in the weird worlds Debby inhabits!” (Christian)
“Singing with Medicine Truck is such a joy! It's not every day that you get to sing with such high caliber vocalists that are so down to earth and happen to be wonderful human beings.” (Travis)
“I’m the plow, I’m the fire starter, and I’m going deep, looking for people to play with me.”
Debby Boland Watt is an improvisational vocal and performance artist, composer, circle singing facilitator and photographer. Presently teaching voice and improvisational singing from Seattle to Tacoma, her diverse background includes classical voice, many years of performing in North American and Europe, an MFA degree in improvisation from Goddard College, a Bachelor’s in Music, Vocal Jazz. from Cornish College of the Arts, and improvisational study and performance with Bobby McFerrin, Rhiannon, Meredith Monk and Pauline Oliveros.
“I wish to play my bodyvoice as Jimi Hendrix played his guitar.” Christian Swenson has an extensive background in dance, mime, voice and improvisation, and is known for his pioneering work in a form he calls
"Human Jazz”, an improvised fusion of singing, acting, and dancing. His work as a solo performer and teacher has taken him to many schools and communities throughout North America, Asia and Europe. Christian has been recipient of several fellowships and is on the Theater Faculty at Seattle University.
“For me it is so important not to leave this earth with music still in us.” Travis Johnson is an Afro roots folk bass singer, improviser, visual artist, photographer, poet and speaker. For the past 23 years, he has had the honor of singing sacred historical songs throughout the U.S. and abroad and he is presently engaged in a solo tour through the West Coast. His diverse musical influences begin with his father, Travis L Johnson, and include Herbert Clay, Robert Sherman, William Ray, Harry Belafonte, Nat King Cole, George Pendergrass, Robert C. Guy, Ben Harper, and Bobby McFerrin.
"Medicine Truck is sometimes poignant, at times deeply moving and often hilarious, as each song is a true original and completely unrehearsed. Truck'in with Christian and Travis has been a marvelous trip." (Debby)
“Singing with Debby and Travis is like having your cake and eating it too! I love their fearlessness, and I’ve never had such good company as down in the deep end with Travis and then off in the weird worlds Debby inhabits!” (Christian)
“Singing with Medicine Truck is such a joy! It's not every day that you get to sing with such high caliber vocalists that are so down to earth and happen to be wonderful human beings.” (Travis)
“I’m the plow, I’m the fire starter, and I’m going deep, looking for people to play with me.”
Debby Boland Watt is an improvisational vocal and performance artist, composer, circle singing facilitator and photographer. Presently teaching voice and improvisational singing from Seattle to Tacoma, her diverse background includes classical voice, many years of performing in North American and Europe, an MFA degree in improvisation from Goddard College, a Bachelor’s in Music, Vocal Jazz. from Cornish College of the Arts, and improvisational study and performance with Bobby McFerrin, Rhiannon, Meredith Monk and Pauline Oliveros.
“I wish to play my bodyvoice as Jimi Hendrix played his guitar.” Christian Swenson has an extensive background in dance, mime, voice and improvisation, and is known for his pioneering work in a form he calls
"Human Jazz”, an improvised fusion of singing, acting, and dancing. His work as a solo performer and teacher has taken him to many schools and communities throughout North America, Asia and Europe. Christian has been recipient of several fellowships and is on the Theater Faculty at Seattle University.
“For me it is so important not to leave this earth with music still in us.” Travis Johnson is an Afro roots folk bass singer, improviser, visual artist, photographer, poet and speaker. For the past 23 years, he has had the honor of singing sacred historical songs throughout the U.S. and abroad and he is presently engaged in a solo tour through the West Coast. His diverse musical influences begin with his father, Travis L Johnson, and include Herbert Clay, Robert Sherman, William Ray, Harry Belafonte, Nat King Cole, George Pendergrass, Robert C. Guy, Ben Harper, and Bobby McFerrin.
TravisTravis Johnson has spent the last three decades developing his craft as a creative as he attends to a methodology of abstraction to tell the untold fragmented story of black existence. His visual art is centered around plywood, clay, text, and found objects. The foundation of Johnson’s work looks through the lens of being raised in the desert landscape cocooned by the family structure of black rural church folks. Travis is looking for the poetics in the materials, peeling back the many layers in search of the untold. In particular, who was violent on your behalf and how does that shape our culture...how can we live more tenderly, while possessing the power to be violent?
Along with his visual art, Travis has spent the last 28 years singing throughout the US on various tours with his family singing group Fivacious. and is currently touring throughout the US with the vocal trio Black Medicine. |
Debby Boland WattDebby is a strong vocalist, improvisational performance artist, coach and master teacher specializing in vocal techniques and production for singers who are interested in all styles of music. Working nationally, with both beginning and professional singers, she has over 50 years of vocal experience, performing across every state in the US as well as Canada and Western Europe, recorded on US and Canadian TV, directed many choirs and worked as a studio musician. Debby earned a Master's degree in Vocal Improvisation and Composition from Goddard College and a Bachelor Degree in Vocal Jazz from Seattle’s Cornish College of the Arts. Her experience and instruction covers classical voice, folk, spiritual, pop, jazz, free improvisation and a cappella circle singing. Debby has had the privilege to perform and study with famed Bobby McFerrin and Rhiannon as well as Pauline Oliveros, Meredith Monk's Ensemble, Kurt Elling and many others. Currently, Debby teaches creative approaches to Voice at Studio VOX! in Tacoma and Side Rail Collective in Georgetown, WA.
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Christian SwensonHuman Jazz; Improvisation with the body and voice-dissolving the boundary between self and other.
Christian is a Seattle-based performing artist pioneering under the title of “Human Jazz”, His work is an improvised fusion of singing, acting, and dancing and has been seen throughout this country and in Canada, Europe, and Asia. Christian's diverse training includes dance, mime, voice, as well as work with Korean shaman, Hi-ah Park, and the late Pakistani master-singer, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. Christian has received Fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Washington State Arts Commission, and Artist Trust of WA. He continues to be a regular at Seattle's Contact Improvisation Jam and co-leads a vocal improvisation jam at the Seattle Drum School in Georgetown, WA. |
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Tacoma's Giraffe: "Amazing evening in Tacoma sent us to the moon."
Seattle Folk Life: "Well THAT was a BLAST! Thanks all circle singers, friends 'n lovers... a piece of heaven for sure. 🧡 Medicine Truck thanks you from the bottom of all 4 tires!"
Improv Singing with the Pros: "Singing with the PROs was so much fun last night. Can't wait to resonate with all of you again at Medicine Truck's next event!"
*Singing with the Pros: Medicine Truck hosted an intermediate/advanced singer workshop in Seattle; a unique opportunity for experienced vocalists to deepen their musical fluency, and explore the genre of improvisational voice while honing listening, expressive, and collaborative abilities.