King of Monster Island: A Wild Memoir (2019)

Performance art (devised music, theater, dance, spoken word)​

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KOMI is a hybrid theater-concert-storytelling performance co-created by Emily Lau and nationally-known multi-instrumentalist Tina Chancey. This auto-biographical performance challenges the barrier between early music, folk music, jazz, devised theater, improvisation, dance, spoken word, and stage design.

 

In this virtuosic display of ease and elegance, juxtaposed on self-depreciating realism, Chancey and Lau celebrates a life lived in music: a life forged in pain and tragedy, rich in creativity and joy, hard to talk about but fun to sing about, and especially fun to watch. The project covers music as varied as 14th c. lais by Guillaume de Machaut, Sephardic music, famed English tunes, reworking of songs by Tom Lehrer and Flory Jagoda, 17th century virtuosic viol and vocal music, extended improvisations, and original songs, juvenilla, pardoy, and satire composed by Chancey and Lau.

 

KOMI's premiere performances were presented by Big Mouth Society in Portland, OR.