Robin Holcomb

Robin Holcomb forged her path as a singer and songwriter under the Nonesuch imprint, drawing from an upbringing in Georgia, engagements with experimental players in New York, and periods spent on both coasts. Following studies at the University of Santa Cruz, she settled in New York alongside her husband Wayne Horvitz and helped establish Studio Henry as a venue for poetry readings and live performances. She also composed large-ensemble works for the New York Composers Orchestra, an ensemble she started with Horvitz. The couple moved to Seattle in 1988, where Holcomb shifted toward vocal performance through the debut of her theatrical piece Angels at the Four Corners, a narrative song cycle in which she performed several numbers herself. Material from that project surfaced on her self-titled debut album, released in 1990. Her next effort, Rockabye, arrived in 1992 and sustained a comparable approach, pairing reflective narrative songs with folk-rooted arrangements. Little Three, from 1996, marked a departure as an almost entirely instrumental piano recording. After a decade without new vocal material, she issued Big Time in 2002, enlisting guests such as Bill Frisell, Kate and Anna McGarrigle, and violist Eyvind Kang. The split release Solos with Wayne Horvitz came out on Songlines in 2004, followed by John Brown's Body on Tzadik in 2006.