Kirin McElwain - Youth (2025) Hi Res

Trained as a classical cellist, on Youth McElwain excavates her formative memories of learning the cello and her relationship to her creativity through a sonic palette of cello, halldorophone, viola da gamba, voice, feedback, and cello processed into unrecognizable shards through modular synthesizer.

The bulk of the material for Youth was composed over the course of five days during a residency at EMS Stockholm while working with the halldorophone, a self-feedbacking cello-like instrument. With the addition of ethereal vocals and unflinching electronic textures, the seven tracks skate between sub-heavy drone, loose pop song structures, and hypnotic synth textures.

“The juxtaposition of the ethereal with the harsh in this music is the result of getting very different parts of myself into conversation with each other, and is also reflective of the inner workings of my relationship to the cello.” shares McElwain. “I’m grateful to be able to express myself on my instrument, but my work with electronics has been a source of joy and liberation that has helped me evolve that relationship and has also given me a way to integrate these seemingly disparate aspects of myself."

Youth experiments with the breaking of expected forms, sitting with grief and uncertainty, and in the process forges a new musical language and artistic identity. Negotiating elements of harsh noise with crisp passages of cello, the dichotomy of the work balances the deft hand of classical training with the mysterious and often chaotic nature of modular synthesis. By continuing to turn towards the uncomfortable, McElwain holds up a mirror to both her practice and herself in a patently honest way that showcases a work of astounding maturity and verisimilitude.