ChiaraOscuro is the solo experimental ethereal project of vocalist, multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, improviser, and multimedia artist Chiara Viscomi. While a classically trained singer, she draws upon an eclectic patchwork of influences, from the sounds of the Silk Road and the Balkans to free jazz to “voice as instrument” to extended vocal techniques incorporating loops and electronics. She also counts artists such as Sussan Deyhim, Sheila Chandra, Kate Bush, and the golden-era female 4AD oeuvre of the 80s as part of her artistic lineage. 

Chiara weaves unexpected, diverse threads into a vivid sonic tapestry exploring the female voice and experience: from ethereal, studied, and refined to chthonic, raw, uninhibited, and undomesticated. 

Anachronistic torch songs and lush, cinematic anthems are created via an intricate filigree of vocal loops, plugged accordion drones, curated samples, percussive pianos, hazy synths, and a broad, eclectic vocal palette, as well as unconventional recording locations and instrumentation. Her protean vocals tantalizingly reveal a pulsing, uncompromising emotional jugular.

Ultimately, this exploration is fueled by allowing the music to become a channel for the collective un/conscious, by duende, by surfing the delicious precarity of improvisation, and by the interrelationship between performer and audience.

Her latest recording and first full-length album, "Rancor:Succor," plumbs the murky depths of inner and outer betrayal, excruciating desire and longing, choked creativity, corrosive rage, isolation, anxiety, and grief--as well as beautifully jarring, life-altering involutions of the divine feminine. 

Two tracks on the album, "La Perdita" and "In the Manner of Serpents," were recorded at The TANK, a 7-story steel water tank-turned-recording space in Rangely, Colorado with a remarkable 40-second reverb sustain. Mastered by Heba Kadry and produced by ChiaraOscuro and Marta Salogni, Skot Brown, and Daniel Knowles.