Emily Wells
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Emily Wells (born November 20, 1981) is an American multi-instrumentalist,
vocalist Singing is the art of creating music with the voice. It is the oldest form of musical expression, and the human voice can be considered the first musical instrument. The definition of singing varies across sources. Some sources define singi ...
,
composer A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. Etymology and def ...
,
arranger In music, an arrangement is a musical adaptation of an existing composition. Differences from the original composition may include reharmonization, melodic paraphrasing, orchestration, or formal development. Arranging differs from orchestrat ...
, and producer whose genres encompass
alternative Alternative or alternate may refer to: Arts, entertainment and media * Alternative (Kamen Rider), Alternative (''Kamen Rider''), a character in the Japanese TV series ''Kamen Rider Ryuki'' * Alternative comics, or independent comics are an altern ...
,
experimental An experiment is a procedure carried out to support or refute a hypothesis, or determine the efficacy or likelihood of something previously untried. Experiments provide insight into cause-and-effect by demonstrating what outcome occurs whe ...
,
hip-hop Hip-hop or hip hop (originally disco rap) is a popular music genre that emerged in the early 1970s from the African-American community of New York City. The style is characterized by its synthesis of a wide range of musical techniques. Hi ...
and classical. In addition to playing instruments such as
violin The violin, sometimes referred to as a fiddle, is a wooden chordophone, and is the smallest, and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in regular use in the violin family. Smaller violin-type instruments exist, including the violino picc ...
and
analog synthesizer An analog synthesizer () is a synthesizer that uses Analogue electronics, analog circuits and analog signals to generate sound electronically. The earliest analog synthesizers in the 1920s and 1930s, such as the Trautonium, were built with a var ...
s, she uses loops, sample pads, and acoustic drums to achieve a layered effect.


Early life

Emily Wells was born in
Amarillo, Texas Amarillo ( ; Spanish language, Spanish for "yellow") is a city in the U.S. state of Texas and the county seat of Potter County, Texas, Potter County, though most of the southern half of the city extends into Randall County, Texas, Randall County ...
, United States. Her father was a music minister, and Wells began playing the violin at age four. In 1990 she moved with her family to
Indianapolis, Indiana Indianapolis ( ), colloquially known as Indy, is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Indiana, most populous city of the U.S. state of Indiana and the county seat of Marion County, Indiana, Marion ...
, where she lived until she began traveling in 2000. While traveling she made her residence primarily in New York, where she would later move after an 8-year stay in Los Angeles.


Music career


Early solo albums (2000-2010)

At age thirteen she began issuing her own recordings on cassette, starting with an unofficial release with 100 copies. After several unofficial tapes, in 2000 she "took up" with
Epic Records Epic Records is an American record label owned by Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America, the American division of Japanese conglomerate Sony is a Japanese multinational conglomerate (company), cong ...
but did not actually sign with them. ''Beautiful Sleepyhead & the Laughing Yaks'' was her official full-length debut in 2006, with all the tracks written, performed, produced, and mixed by Wells. Her sophomore album ''The Symphonies'' featured bassist Joey Reina and drummer Sam Halterman alongside Wells. Wells was interviewed and performed "Symphony 1 in the Barrel of a Gun" on episode four of ''
Last Call with Carson Daly ''Last Call with Carson Daly'' is an American late-night television series that was broadcast by NBC from 2002 to 2019. Hosted by former MTV personality Carson Daly, the series was initially formatted as a late-night talk show in line with '' ...
'', which aired through
NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of Comcast. It is one of NBCUniversal's ...
on September 18, 2009. In September 2010, after recently moving from Los Angeles to New York, Wells was joined onstage by vocalist and harmonium player
Shilpa Ray Shilpa Ray (born ) is an American singer-songwriter from Brooklyn, New York with a DIY punk experimental sound. Her music has been compared to Blondie, The Cramps, and Screamin' Jay Hawkins and her singing has been compared to the style of Pa ...
. The performance was positively reviewed by ''
The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. It was founded on February 21, 1925, by Harold Ross and his wife Jane Grant, a reporter for ''The New York T ...
''.


''Mama'' and Partisan Records (2012)

In 2012, she released her full-length album ''Mama'' through
Partisan Records Partisan Records is an independent record label with offices in London, Berlin, and Los Angeles, as well as in New York City, where the company was co-founded in 2007 by Tim Putnam and Ian Wheeler. The label, initially run out of Putnam's South B ...
. The lead single, "Mama's Gonna give You Love," was featured in ''
The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. It was founded on February 21, 1925, by Harold Ross and his wife Jane Grant, a reporter for ''The New York T ...
'' on April 10, 2012. She also released a free remixed version of ''Mama'' on Partisan, with remixers such as
Jeremiah Jae Jeremy Tynes Irving (born June 7, 1989), known as Jeremiah Jae, is an American rapper and record producer from Chicago. Early life Jae was born in Chicago, Illinois, on June 7, 1989. He is the son of jazz composer and musician Robert Irving II ...
,
Kid Koala Eric Yick Keung San (born December 5, 1974), better known by his stage name Kid Koala, is a Canadian scratch DJ, music producer, theatre producer, film composer, multimedia-performer and visual artist. His career began as a scratch DJ in 1994. K ...
, Baths, and
Deerhoof Deerhoof is an American musical group formed in San Francisco in 1994. It consists of founding drummer Greg Saunier, bassist and singer Satomi Matsuzaki, and guitarists John Dieterich and Ed Rodriguez. Beginning as an improvised noise punk band ...
. As of 2012 she was collaborating on material with
Clint Mansell Clinton Darryl Mansell (; born 7 November 1963) is an English musician, singer, and composer. He served as the lead vocalist of alt-rock band Pop Will Eat Itself. After the band's dissolution, Mansell moved to the United States and embarked on ...
, a scorewriter and former frontman of
Pop Will Eat Itself Pop Will Eat Itself are an English alternative rock band formed in 1986 in Stourbridge in the West Midlands of England with members from Birmingham, Coventry and the Black Country. Initially known as a grebo act, they changed style to incorpo ...
. That April 2012 she created a featured mixtape for ''Magnet Magazine'', and Wells has periodically performed live sessions for recording studios, websites, and radio stations, including
Daytrotter Daytrotter was a recording studio, music venue and subscription-based music discovery website located in Atlanta, United States. It hosted recording sessions with indie music acts. The original studio in Rock Island, Illinois, was founded in 20 ...
in April 2012,
WYNC WYNC (1540 AM) is a radio station broadcasting a Gospel music format. Licensed to Yanceyville, North Carolina Yanceyville is a town in, and the county seat of, Caswell County, North Carolina, United States. Located in the Piedmont Triad regio ...
's Soundcheck in May 2013, Laundro Matinee in October 2014, and
KCRW KCRW (89.9 FM broadcasting, FM) is an NPR member station broadcasting from the campus of Santa Monica College in Santa Monica, California, where the station is licensed. KCRW airs original news and music programming in addition to programming ...
in June 2013.


Tour diaries and soundtracks (2013)

Wells has written tour diaries and articles for such publications as ''
American Songwriter ''American Songwriter'' is a bimonthly magazine covering songwriting. Established in 1984, it features interviews, songwriting tips, news, reviews and lyric contest. The magazine is based in Nashville, Tennessee. History The ''American Songwri ...
'', ''Impose Magazine,'' and ''
The Huffington Post ''HuffPost'' (''The Huffington Post'' until 2017, itself often abbreviated as ''HPo'') is an American progressive news website, with localized and international editions. The site offers news, satire, blogs, and original content, and covers p ...
'', and she has appeared live multiple times on
NPR National Public Radio (NPR) is an American public broadcasting organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It serves as a national Radio syndication, syndicator to a network of more ...
, with an interview on
All Songs Considered ''All Songs Considered'' is a weekly online podcast and radio program hosted by Robin Hilton. It was created in January 2000 by NPR's ''All Things Considered'' then-director Bob Boilen and produced by Robin Hilton beginning in 2001. At first, ...
on April 4, 2013, and a live performance on
KCRW KCRW (89.9 FM broadcasting, FM) is an NPR member station broadcasting from the campus of Santa Monica College in Santa Monica, California, where the station is licensed. KCRW airs original news and music programming in addition to programming ...
on July 11, 2013. In 2013 she composed a song for director
Park Chan-Wook Park Chan-wook (; born 23 August 1963) is a Koreans, South Korean film director, screenwriter, Film producer, producer, and former film critic. He is considered one of the most prominent filmmakers of Cinema of South Korea, South Korean cinema a ...
's movie '' Stoker'' and toured South Korea promoting the film. A single titled "Passenger" for a then upcoming acoustic version of ''Mama'' was released in 2013. ''
The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...
'' named her New Band of the Week No. 1,503 on April 30, 2013. An acoustic version of ''Mama'' was released in on June 11, 2013, in the United States and United Kingdom through
Partisan Records Partisan Records is an independent record label with offices in London, Berlin, and Los Angeles, as well as in New York City, where the company was co-founded in 2007 by Tim Putnam and Ian Wheeler. The label, initially run out of Putnam's South B ...
. It had been recorded with a Tascam 388, with no digital effects added to the basic instrumentation. Her songwriting methods were featured in a July 2013 edition of ''
Performer Magazine ''Performer'' is an American music magazine aimed at independent musicians. It has been in publication since 1991 and is distributed nationally throughout the United States. The magazine focuses primarily on musicians who are unsigned and on sma ...
''. Among other shows, Wells performed at
Le Guess Who? Le Guess Who? is a Dutch music festival featuring different music genres: from avant-garde, jazz, hip hop, electronic, experimental, noise rock, indie rock, world music and others. This festival was founded by Bob van Heur and Johan Gijsen. It ...
festival in
The Netherlands , Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...
in November 2013, and also that year she collaborated live with
Questlove Ahmir K. Thompson (born January 20, 1971), known professionally as Questlove (stylized as ), is an American drummer, record producer, disc jockey, filmmaker, music journalist, and actor. He is the drummer and joint frontman (with Black Thought ...
at
Electronium The Electronium, created by Raymond Scott, is an early combined electronic synthesizer and algorithmic composition / generative music machine. Its place in history is unusual, because while in intention it is analogous to the digital algorithmic ...
in 2013. She performed with
The Roots The Roots are an American Hip-hop, hip hop band formed in 1987 by singer Black Thought, Tariq "Black Thought" Trotter and drummer Questlove, Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The Roots serve as the house band on NBC's ''T ...
and
Aloe Blacc Egbert Nathaniel Dawkins III (born January 7, 1979), known professionally as Aloe Blacc (), is an American singer and rapper. He is known for his guest performance on Avicii's 2013 single "Wake Me Up (Avicii song), Wake Me Up", which peaked on ...
at the Rock the Clinton Global Initiative event that year as well.


Recent projects and tours (2014-2015)

"Mama's Gonna Give You Love" was used in the January 2015 trailer for season 3 of the TV series '' Bates Motel''. On March 27, 2015, Wells gave a well-received keynote at Hackfort2 at the fourth annual
Treefort Music Fest Treefort Music Fest is a five-day indie rock festival held at several venues throughout downtown Boise, Idaho in late March. The inaugural festival took place from March 20–23, 2012, featuring Built to Spill, The Joy Formidable, Poliça, a ...
in Boise, Idaho wherein she presented her methods of composition at the intersection of art and technology and the growth of her sensibility as a musician. Performing with a reduced kit ''sans'' drums, she played earlier and later versions of her song "So, Sunday." She headlined on the main stage on the final day of the Treefort in 2015 and participated in the festival's Yogafort as well. Wells was also broadcast on air by WQXR in March 2015, when she performed at Ecstatic Music Festival for the 80th birthday party of
Terry Riley Terrence Mitchell Riley (born June 24, 1935) is an American composer and performing musician best known as a pioneer of the minimalist music, minimalist school of composition. Influenced by jazz and Indian classical music, his work became notab ...
, along with other musicians such as
Marco Benevento Marco Benevento (born July 22, 1977) is an American pianist, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and record producer, who has been a fixture of the New York experimental music rock music, rock and jazz scene since 1999. He is the founder and rec ...
,
Nancy Whang LCD Soundsystem is an American dance-punk revival band from Brooklyn, New York, formed in 2002 by James Murphy, of DFA Records. The band comprises Murphy (vocals, various instruments), Nancy Whang (synthesizer, keyboards, vocals), Pat Mahone ...
, and Face the Music. Since 2016 she has released three full-length albums on the imprint Thesis and Instinct.


Style and influences

In 2015, Wells stated that amongst her influences are the
music theorist Music theory is the study of theoretical frameworks for understanding the practices and possibilities of music. '' The Oxford Companion to Music'' describes three interrelated uses of the term "music theory": The first is the " rudiments", that ...
John Cage John Milton Cage Jr. (September 5, 1912 – August 12, 1992) was an American composer and music theorist. A pioneer of indeterminacy in music, electroacoustic music, and Extended technique, non-standard use of musical instruments, Cage was one ...
, the
minimalist In visual arts, music, and other media, minimalism is an art movement that began in the post-war era in western art. The movement is often interpreted as a reaction to abstract expressionism and modernism; it anticipated contemporary post-mi ...
composer
Philip Glass Philip Glass (born January 31, 1937) is an American composer and pianist. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century. Glass's work has been associated with minimal music, minimalism, being built up fr ...
, and the
hip-hop Hip-hop or hip hop (originally disco rap) is a popular music genre that emerged in the early 1970s from the African-American community of New York City. The style is characterized by its synthesis of a wide range of musical techniques. Hi ...
group
Wu-Tang Clan Wu-Tang Clan is an American hip hop collective formed in Staten Island, New York City, in 1992. Its members include RZA, GZA, Method Man, Raekwon, Ghostface Killah, Inspectah Deck, U-God, Masta Killa, and, until his death in 2004, O ...
.


Discography


EPs


Singles


Collaborations


Guest appearances


Personal life

Wells is queer.


See also

* List of violinists


References


External links


Official websiteEmily Wells
on
YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Wells, Emily Living people 1981 births American women violinists Musicians from Texas 21st-century American violinists American multi-instrumentalists American composers American queer musicians