Stolen Voices

Stolen Voices is a series of live performance pieces funded by the Arts Council England and the Live Art Development Agency, a series of commissioned musical compositions supported by Sound and Music and Aldeburgh Music and a book publication commissioned by Copy Press an independent publisher dedicated to extending ideas of writing, pictures and readability. Editors are Eve Lomax and Kristin Kreider.

Stolen Voices is an ongoing inquiry by Rebecca Collins and Johanna Linsley, with rotating collaborators, inspired by eavesdropping.

The work imagines public spaces as semi-fictional constructions, as if an Agatha Christie novel has shattered over a town and fragments caught in the local soundscape. Summoned to these spaces, the artists seek access, navigate pathways and decode traces of an as-yet-undefined event. Stolen Voices particularly investigates the UK coast. The sense of borders and border crossings, evidence of lost technologies, shifting economies and ways of life, and the romance of the sea – all of these add up to prime eavesdropping territory. The project takes a variety of forms, from participatory workshops to new music composition, experimental performance, community gig nights, an installation called the Eavesdropbox, and a book project currently in process which we call a sonic detective novel.

Stolen Voices has been supported using public funds from the Arts Council England. It was initiated in 2014 as a Live Art Development Agency DIY project, in association with Sound & Music and Arts Bournemouth. The project was commissioned as a Silver City Stories project, with support from Aberdeen City Council, the University of Aberdeen and Visit Aberdeenshire, in partnership with Aberdeen Performing Arts. In Autumn, 2017, the project received support from the Live Art Development Agency, SPILL Festival and Snape Maltings. Previous supporters include Helix Arts and East Durham Creates.

Stolen Voices generates and puts to work a co-authored research methodology for attuning to the specificities of site, drawing on a listening practice of expanded eavesdropping. The research methodology informs the creation of live performance, collaborations with musical composers and the writing of a book publication.