Chicago composer, flutist, and performance artist Janice Misurell-Mitchell offers a unique vision of American contemporary music. Drawing on traditional Western European classical elements, she fashions pieces that reach into the rich sources of jazz, popular and ethnic music. “Her attempts at stretching music’s boundaries—by incorporating improvisation and performance art...have produced refreshing results.” Ted Shen, Chicago Reader.

Each of her pieces for flute has found its audience: On Thin Ice, for flute and guitar, was a winner in the 1988 NFA Newly Published Music Competition; Sub-Music and Song, for solo flute, was a finalist in the National Flute Association’s Newly Published Music Competition in 1986; Uncommon Time, for solo flute, commissioned by the National Flute Association for its High School Soloist Competition for 1991, and Sometimes the City is Silent, written for that competition for 2003 have been praised by teachers and students alike for their musical and practical approach to extended techniques. Continuing in this tradition, Profaning the Sacred (2000) for voice/flute/alto flute and bass clarinet/clarinet is a virtuosic work that promises to excite both performers and audiences.

A composer of innovative works for larger ensembles as well, Ms. Misurell-Mitchell has created highly acclaimed pieces such as Luminaria, an orchestral work recorded by the Czech Radio Symphony, and Sermon of the Middle-Aged Revolutionary Spider, a musical monodrama for tenor, chamber ensemble and Gospel choir based on the poetry of Angela Jackson and written for world-renowned tenor William Brown. In 2003 she and videographer Jim Kropp of Creative Spark! created a video of Sermon.

Since 1991 Ms. Misurell-Mitchell has been developing music combined with speech, theatre and dance; she has produced videos of two of these works as well. After the History, for voice/flute and percussion, presents views of war through a variety of musical perspectives. Scat/Rap Counterpoint, for voice and percussion, features nine different characters, played by the composer, who engage in rhyming dialogues on the state of the arts in the U.S.: “the evening’s showstopper,” writes Andrew Patner, music critic for the Chicago Sun-Times.

Janice Misurell-Mitchell has been Co-Artistic Director of CUBE Contemporary Chamber Ensemble in Chicago since 1989. She teaches at the School of the Art Institute and in the Music Department at the University of Chicago. She was chosen as a “Chicagoan of the Year” in classical music for 2002 by music critic John von Rhein of the Chicago Tribune.

Ms. Misurell-Mitchell received degrees from Northwestern University, the Peabody Conservatory and Goucher College. Her honors include grants from the Illinois Arts Council, the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs, Meet the Composer, residencies at the Atlantic Center for the Arts and the Ragdale Foundation, and awards and commissions from the National Flute Association, the Youth Symphony of DuPage, the International Alliance for Women in Music, the Women’s Philharmonic, Northwestern University and others. Her works are performed throughout the United States and Europe and have been featured on the Public Broadcasting Network, at the National Flute Association Conventions, the Donne in Musica festival, the Museum of Contemporary Art and Symphony Center in Chicago and at Carnegie Hall.

Her music is published by Margun Music (available through Shawnee Press), the Needham Publishing Company and Arizona University Publications. Her chamber piece, Alone Together, for bass clarinet and double bass, and her composition for orchestra, Luminaria are available on compact disks produced by MMC Recordings. Two of her award-winning pieces, On Thin Ice, for flute and guitar, and Sub-Music and Song, for solo flute, are available on OPUS ONE Recordings. Profaning the Sacred is recorded on the CD "Magical Place Of My Dreams" with the composer on flute and voice and Richard Nunemaker of the Houston Symphony on clarinet and bass clarinet. It is available through Arizona University Recordings: CD 3118, AURec@AURec.com.

PERFORMANCES AND LECTURES

Ms. Misurell-Mitchell is available to present performances and lecture recitals on her work and related areas such as extended techniques and notation for the flute, text and music, jazz/new music, as well as for residencies in composition. For information please contact Janice Misurell-Mitchell, 1331 East 50th Street, Chicago, IL 60615
(tel.) 773.536.4181 jmisurell@aol.com

SELECTED COMPOSITIONS (works with no publisher’s reference are available through
the composer)

SOLO MUSIC
Dark was the Night, for solo guitar (1994) 9’
Mamiwata, for solo marimba (1998) 10’
Mobius Trip, for solo flute (1973) 7’
Sub-Music and Song, for solo flute (1983) 6’30” Margun Music
Sometimes the City is Silent, for solo flute (2002) 5’30”
Speechscape, for solo alto saxophone (1985) 8’30” Needham Publishing Company
Uncommon Time, for solo flute (1991) 5’30” Margun Music

CHAMBER and ORCHESTRAL MUSIC
Alone Together, for bass clarinet and double bass (1987) 13’ Margun Music
Cantus Interruptus, for alto and tenor saxophones, perc. and piano (1993) 10’ Margun Music
Deconstruction Blues, for English horn (alto saxophone) and kybd. synthesizer (1991) 11’
Dichophony, for two trumpets (1990) 2’
Echoes of Obiter Dictum, for flute, guitar, and percussion (1992) 3’
Elisions, for eighteen winds (1981) 21’
Juba-lee, for orchestra ( 2001) 10 ‘
Luminaria, for orchestra (1995) 10’ Margun Music
On Thin Ice, for flute, and guitar or marimba (1988, 1999) 10’ Margun Music
Profaning the Sacred, for flute/alto flute and bass clarinet/clarinet (2000) 17’
Paradigms, for seven flutes, percussion and bass (1977) 18’; abridged version, 10’ (2001)
Sermon of the Middle-Aged Revolutionary Spider, for tenor and nine instruments, with optionalGospel choir (1997) 26’
String Quartet No. 1 (1983) 21’
Transfusions, for alto and tenor saxophones, trumpet and trombone (1984) 10’
Trash Talk, for saxophone quartet (1999) 10’
Vanishing Points/Quantum Leaps, for clarinet, violin, cello, and piano (1979) I, 8’; I, II, III, 25’

CHORAL MUSIC
Mad Song, for speaker and a cappella chorus (1975) 18’

THEATER/PERFORMANCE PIECES
After the History, for voice/flute and percussion (1991) 13’ Notated and \ improvisational material.
Are You Ready? for solo voice (1995) 7’ Notated and improvisational material.
Blooz Man/Poet Woman, for flute/voice (2000) 7 ‘
The Gift of Tongues, with Catherine Slade, actor. Voice and electronics, flute/voice (1999) 10’ Notated and improvisational material.
Give Me an A! for voice/flute (1999) 8’ Notated and improvisational material.
Kiddush, for voice/flute (1998) 6’ Notated and improvisational material.
Motel...loneliness, for voice/flute (1997) 6’ Notated and improvisational material.
Rush Life Rush, for voice, flute, and percussion (1992) 15’ Notated and improvisational material.
Scat/Rap Counterpoint, for voice and percussion (1993) 10’ Written text only.
A Silent Woman, for vocalist, voice/flute, clarinet and piano (2002) 16 ‘ Notated and improvisational material

VIDEOTAPES (several formats available)
After the History, for voice/flute and percussion (1996) 14’
Scat/Rap Counterpoint’, for voice, flute and percussion (1995) 10’
Sermon of the Spider, featuring William Brown, tenor, Philip Morehead, conductor, CUBE, and the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago Gospel Choir. Filmed and edited by Jim Kropp, Creative Spark! from a concept and performance of Sermon of the Middle-Aged Revolutionary Spider by Janice Misurell-Mitchell (2003) 30’

RECORDINGS
Alone Together, for bass clarinet and double bass, on compact disk, Golden Petals, produced by MMC Recordings, 1993. Richard Nunemaker, bass clar.; Peter Herbert, double bass.
Luminaria, for orchestra, on compact disk, A Portrait of American Women Composers, Vol. II, MMC Recordings, 2001. Czech Radio Symphony, Vladimir Válek, conductor.
On Thin Ice, for flute and guitar, and Sub-Music and Song, for solo flute, on compact disk #160 produced by OPUS ONE Recordings, 1994. Caroline Pittman, flute; Jeffrey Kust, guitar
Profaning the Sacred, for voice/flute/alto flute and bass clarinet/clarinet, on compact disk, Magical Place of My Dreams, AUR CD 3118,produced by Arizona University Recordings, 2003. Janice Misurell-Mitchell, voice/flutes; Richard Nunemaker, clarinets

PUBLISHERS
Arizona University Publications, tel. (520) 749-9895 AURec@AURec.com
Margun Music: dist. through Shawnee Press (G. Schirmer Music), tel. (800) 962-8584, X212 http://www.schirmer.com/composers/misurell-mitchell/luminaria.html
Needham Publishing Co., Dorn Publications: tel. (508) 359-7004; fax (508) 359-7988

SELECTED REVIEWS

Compositions
Sermon is a monodrama for ‘singing preacher,’ chamber ensemble and gospel choir…[poet Angela] Jackson’s verses are intercut with lines from the Bible, the Hebrew prayer for the dead and other texts. Musically the piece is every bit as eclectic, moving from modernist classical to funky jazz to gospel idioms. Sometimes angry, mostly inspirational, the piece is a rousing call for political and social action. John von Rhein, Chicago Tribune.

“By far the most avant-garde work on the program was Profaning the Sacred by Janice Misurell-Mitchell...The words of the poems [by Allen Ginsberg and Regie Gibson] were spoken into the flute as it was being played, and they were growled, mumbled and shouted, almost unintelligible as though they were burbled from under water...Although not a typical setting of lyrics, the poems were presented effectively, and were given an especially caring performance.” Susan Cohn Lackman, Journal of the International Alliance for Women in Music, Vol. 7, No. 3.

“After the History...a provocative piece...inspired by the fall of the Berlin Wall, it updates the Schoenbergian speech-song to incorporate extended flute techniques like overblowing, tapping and flutter tonguing...she believes apathy to be the arts’ worst enemy, and After the History echoes some of the century’s greatest voices of protest, from Brecht to the beat poets to hip-hop.” Ted Shen, Chicago Reader.

“Janice Misurell-Mitchell’s On Thin Ice, for guitar and flute, is a ten-minute workout for both instruments. Pitch content and form are secondary to the sheer diversity of extended instrumental techniques that keep the music interesting and moving. An improvised quality is felt through rhythmic separation of the lines; this also allows moments of simultaneity, such as at cadence points, to be doubly arresting... The composer’s Sub-Music and Song, for solo flute (1983) was developed from an improvisation. The first section, Sub-Music, is filled with rough, jagged figures that eventually become more refined in the Song. The music flows from a knowledge of flute technique and could only have been written by a flute player. Michael Johns, International Alliance for Women in Music Journal.

Golden Petals...is a collection of five pieces showing five distinct and distinctive permutations of jazz--the idiom as practiced by Artie Shaw,...Igor Stravinsky,...and as practiced by Janice Misurell-Mitchell in her paradoxical and often haunting Alone Together, for bass clarinet and double bass...explor[ing] the outermost possibilities of instrumental timbre and technique; and push[ing] the concept of thematic variation to impressive heights. William Zagorski, Fanfare.

In Vanishing Points/Quantum Leaps, for clarinet, violin, cello and piano...Janice Misurell-Mitchell uses an exquisitely delicate touch to distort and twist her musical material. Joan Reinthaler, The Washington Post.

"A work for solo flute by Janice Misurell-Mitchell takes the Mobius strip as its visual starting point, developing one chunk of sound and exploring its permutations as it travels down an imaginary "strip" ...Mobius Trip conquers a problem often found in contemporary music literature: the work preserves the integrity of its theoretical premise while maintaining a purely esthetic guise." Kate Rivers, The Washington Post.

"Janice Misurell-Mitchell's Transfusions is a brassy bebop romp emphasizing canon and musical gesture..." Dennis Polkow, preview, American Women Composers, Midwest, Chicago Reader.

Performance Art, Flute
" ‘Are you ready?’ asked the lady. And maybe we thought we were. But the performance that followed left me helpless and speechless, and emotionally stretched...the question lasted 15 minutes, and it encompassed a range of styles that left me breathless. Completely without inhibition, unconcerned when her attractive face was twisted beyond recognition, this extraordinary woman revealed her wit, her humour, her understanding, her creativity, her courage, and her passion." Gisele Turner, Daily News, Durban, South Africa

“The evening’s show-stopper was the video version of DePaul University Professor Janice Misurell-Mitchell’s 1993 Scat/Rap Counterpoint. The flutist and performance artist herself portrayed a variety of characters who took up various challenges to the composer’s role in infectious raps accompanied by the steady beat of Dane Maxim Richeson’s trap drums.” Andrew Patner, Chicago Sun-Times.

“Of the two vocal works on the program, Misurell-Mitchell and Catherine Slade’s Gift of Tongues is more experimental and provocative. It quotes from the Bible’s description of the Tower of Babel, and as performed by the two creators, comprehensible words rose from a primordial ooze of moans and grunts but dissolved later into a babble of disjointed syllables. Misurell-Mitchell expertly used the flute as her other voice.” Ted Shen, Chicago Tribune.

“Misurell-Mitchell has evolved from a rather traditional flutist through a period of experimenting with the technical limits of her instruments into a full-fledged performance artist who has used amplification, video and even rap in her performances.” Andrew Patner, Chicago Sun-Times.

“Janice Misurell-Mitchell revealed herself as composer/performer/improviser in Motel...loneliness, for flute/voice, a piece which received well-deserved, long applause from the audience.” Hilary Tann, Journal of the International Alliance for Women in Music, Vol.6, Nos. 1/2.

“Misurell-Mitchell’s ‘Kiddush” continues her experiment of melding flute and voice. She sang and at times spoke words of a Seder blessing (in Hebrew and English) into the flute, leaving a trail of echoes. The effect was a rough-hewn outpouring of unshaken faith.” Ted Shen, Chicago Tribune.

“Her ability to communicate the composer’s intention in these pieces [Sollberger, Misurell-Mitchell] was quite impressive, as was her command of a dizzying array of techniques that go far beyond the ‘normal’ requirements of playing the flute well.” Cate Hummel, Flute Fair Review, Chicago Flute Club Pipeline.

“CUBE flutist Janice Misurell-Mitchell also acquitted herself well, coaxing eloquence from Varese’s intricate “Density 21.5.” Ted Shen, Chicago Tribune.

"In Davies' Solita for flute with optional music box, Misurell-Mitchell turned breath-filled eruptions of melody into a coherent, three-part sonata. Her final duet, gradually slowing to match the tempo of a gently tinkling music box, was eloquent." Wynne Delacoma, Chicago Sun-Times.