Marisa M.

Voice, Piano, Composition

     Marisa Michelson is a composer, singer and voice teacher passionate about the human ability to express and communicate through singing/sound-making. Marisa’s music has been called “exquisite” by the New York Times and “the most unique and beautiful I've heard in musical theater” by Theatremania.

 

     Marisa’s most recent opera/music-theatre piece, Tamar of the River, was recently produced by the New York-based Prospect Theatre Company, where it was directed by Daniel Goldstein (Godspell) and choreographed by Chase Brock (Spiderman). Tamar of the River was also produced as a theatrical oratorio by New York Theatre Barn and Choral Chameleon. A recording of Tamar of the River has been released on Yellow Sound Label.

 

     Marisa and playwright Jason Grote were commissioned by Montclair University’s New Works Institute to write Scheherazade - a musical adaptation of Grote’s acclaimed play, 1001. Scheherazade was workshopped with York Theatre in May 2013. Marisa is currently at work on a commission from Paulette Haupt to write a solo musical with Pulitzer Prize-winning librettist Mark Campbell.

 

     Marisa’s songs have been featured at the Kennedy Center, the York, New World Stages, the Duplex Theater and the Flea. Marisa sang with Meredith Monk in Songs of Ascension at BAM and was invited to perform her two-person experimental vocal piece, Voice Becoming at the Basillica in Hudson, NY and the Goetheanum in Switzerland.

 

Marisa is currently pursuing advanced teaching and singing studies with the Libero Canto School of singing based in Vienna. With adults, she brings a relaxed, supportive and holistic approach to freeing the voice, and with children, an emphasis on fun and confidence. Marisa is also an advanced pianist whose approach to teaching piano to children encourages composition and experiencing the piano as an instrument for personal expression.