A Capella Howls and Guttural Adagios: The Unexpected Rise of Metal Vocal Ensembles
Last June, the American public was subjected to a surprising television moment: thirteen extreme vocalists and a conductor covering Carl Orff and Britney Spears before the judges of America’s Got Talent. Immediately after the performance, conductor Pierre-Luc Senécal proudly described Growlers Choir as the only metal choir in the world. I remember this moment vividly: I was one of the vocalists on stage with him.
When my colleagues and I traveled to California to present our number, all of us were convinced that this statement was accurate. Prior research had unearthed experimental vocal ensembles of all sorts (Roomful of Teeth, Joker, Raung Jagat, etc.), but none focused on extreme metal techniques. However, our mainstream debut opened up the discussion about whether or not other similar ensembles existed. A few names were brought to our attention in comments and messages, making us all the more curious about our place in the larger picture. Personally, this new perspective made me very eager to know these groups and understand their similarities and differences from what Growlers Choir does. In this article, I discuss four vocal ensembles rooted in metal music and one predecessor. They are presented in chronological order.
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Mieskuoro Huutajat (Oulu, Finland)
Although not an ensemble referencing metal music or techniques, Mieskuoro Huutajat is a choir of shouting men. Dressed in classic attire, they have been yelling and screaming at audiences since 1987. Mieskuoro Huutajat was founded by composer and conductor Petri Sirviö. By forming an ensemble around the expressive possibilities of screamed voices, he subverted the conventional choir and forced audiences to listen differently. The shouts cover a wide range of dynamics and are separated in sections complementing each other. Lower voices will chant rhythmically while higher ones sustain piercing shrieks. With this radical approach, the Finnish group is a precursor to the metal choirs that now exist. Mieskuoro Huutajat performs in various settings, whether in the streets of Oulu or in international concert halls. Its predisposition for interdisciplinary performances and spontaneous events makes it an eccentric singularity in the field of vocal music. Although similar experiments have been made by Canadian artists Coral Short and Bob Smart in recent years, Mieskuoro Huutajat is unique in its resilient devotion to yelling.
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Ensemble Tikoro (Bandung, Indonesia)
Ensemble Tikoro appears to be the earliest ensemble solely featuring metal vocalists. Founded in 2012, the idea burgeoned from composer and conductor Robi Rusdiana’s master’s project and thesis at ISBI Bandung (Indonesian Arts Institute and Culture in Bandung). Rusdiana gathered vocalists from West Java’s extreme metal underground and forged a unique type of contemporary ensemble: one making exclusive use of distorted vocals and other extended techniques. Ensemble Tikoro has outlasted Rusdiana’s graduate studies and has been creating new music ever since. Performing mostly pieces composed by Rusdiana, the group has also collaborated internationally with choreographer Lucy Guerin in Melbourne, Australia. Another recent collaboration involves Rully Shabara, vocalist of the Yogyakarta-based duo Senyawa. Himself being the conductor of an experimental vocal ensemble called Raung Jagat, Shabara has been pushing the boundaries of vocal expression for years in Java and abroad with his various projects. Associating with Ensemble Tikoro almost seems like a mandatory rite of passage at this point.
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Musically, Ensemble Tikoro has a definitive experimental edge. Although Rusdiana is a classically-trained composer, he is working with unheard sounds in the realm of contemporary music. Therefore, a lot of the exploration and research preceding the composition is based in improvising with the performers. The music is then scored in staff notation. However, the aleatoric elements can still be heard in the various moments of layered whispers, laughs, inhales and other sound effects. Throat singing techniques similar to those used in Central Asia also appear throughout Tikoro’s repertoire.
An attentive listener will notice a salient interest in West Javanese and Indonesian traditions, like during chaotic spoken word passages reminiscent of Javanese theater and comedy. These words are in Sundanese and other Indonesian languages. More explicitly, Ensemble Tikoro has incorporated sung vocals and gamelan instruments in some of its projects. This mixture of old and new sounds reflects a desire to break free from aesthetic boundaries while keeping anchorage in various local traditions.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zaboDu07Iug
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Although the group’s logo describes it as a “Brutal Choir From Hell”, Ensemble Tikoro is composed of between six and eight vocalists plus a conductor and is therefore much smaller than a typical choir. The members proudly stick to the metal dress code and promote the democratization of contemporary music outside of academia. “And contemporary music for all”, you might hear them say in a nod to Metallica’s famous album.
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Hellscore (Tel Aviv, Israel)
Hellscore is perhaps the ensemble most fittingly adorning the “Choir” title. The Israeli group is led by Noa Gruman, a classical singer and choir conductor, and features over 40 singers performing choral arrangements of popular rock and metal songs. Having worked with institutions such as the Israeli Opera, the Israeli Philharmonic, and the Royal Academy of Music in Aalborg, Gruman has been bringing her expertise to the metal world since the mid-2010s. She is the primary arranger of Hellscore’s music and has won an award for “The Most Innovative Arrangement” at the Aarhus Vocal Festival. Better known online as a cover act, Hellscore has also worked with many famous metal bands. The choir notably appears on recent albums by Amorphis, Orphaned Land, Aryeon, Therion, and Alestorm. Naturally, Gruman has also employed Hellscore to perform parts on her own band Scardust’s latest album ‘Strangers’ (2020).
These collaborations suggest a desire for metal bands to favor real choirs over stock samples when incorporating choral arrangements in their music. Given the strong neoclassical influence in certain sub-genres, the demand is certainly there for singers who can read scores and deliver performances that cater to metal bands’ needs. With Hellscore’s specialty and repertoire, they may become the leading actor in this department. Although the group’s personnel was initially small, with just a few friends and family members joining Gruman, the ensemble has since evolved into the full choir that it is today. With its deep root in choral singing, Hellscore builds on the kinship between European classical and metal actively developed by gothic and symphonic branches of heavy music.
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Growlers Choir (Montreal, Canada)
Growlers Choir was founded in Montreal by composer Pierre-Luc Senécal. Although the idea was brought up and discussed as early as 2016, it took three more years for the project to materialize. Senécal first composed “The Dayking”, a twenty-minute piece premiered in May of 2019, performed by 18 vocalists gathered from the Quebec metal scene. The dramatic and atmospheric music was set to the words of poet Fortner Anderson, who also acts as a narrator in the performance. To write the piece, Senécal opted for a graphic score to accommodate singers who came with unequal knowledge of staff notation. This first performance created a small buzz online when Metalsucks posted the video recording on their YouTube channel. Senécal, who had previously worked with metal vocalists on smaller-scale projects, now had a template for a sustainable ensemble.
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During the Covid-19 pandemic, a resolutely more “metal” piece was composed and recorded remotely while scheduled performances were pushed back. Meanwhile, the ensemble’s personnel stabilized around 15 members and Senécal switched to Western staff notation for all of his pieces for growlers. When it became possible to perform in the Quebec region again, a unique concert was produced in June 2021. Senécal’s ensemble joined the classical choir Temps Fort, conveniently led by Growlers Choir member Pascal Germain-Berardi. With his double background in classical music and metal, Germain-Berardi composed a massive thirty-minute work full of counterpoints between the clean and distorted voices. Senécal also re-arranged “The Dayking”, transforming the electroacoustic track into a choral arrangement. Titled “Extrêmes Vocaux” (Vocal Extremes) and held in a local church, this concert opened the door to the classical choir culture and network for the Growlers. Since then, the ensemble’s projects have been twofold: amplified performances featuring only Growlers Choir and a capella concerts in collaboration with choirs. While the former indulge in a more metal-infused repertoire, the latter are focused on searching for new compositional approaches.
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So far, Growlers Choir’s projects have mainly occurred in Montreal and neighboring cities. However, the group gained a sudden burst of international attention when it auditioned for America’s Got Talent 2022. While the material presented for television differs greatly from what Growlers Choir usually performs, it was an interesting stunt that caused a fair share of controversy among US conservative and religious audiences. Senécal’s background as an electroacoustic composer heavily informs his creative process, one focused on vocal timbres and textures. Sound design and electronic backing tracks often accompany the voices. Divided into three groups (low, mid, and high), the growlers make extensive use of exhaled and inhaled sounds usually associated with extreme metal. As is the case with Ensemble Tikoro, Growlers Choir also incorporates various whispers, throat singing techniques, and vocal effects in its repertoire.
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The Doom Eternal Soundtrack (Austin (TX), United States)
In March 2020, composer Mick Gordon posted a video entitled “DOOM Eternal : The Heavy Metal Choir” on his YouTube channel. The video is a making-of of the soundtrack Gordon produced for the successful DOOM franchise’s latest video game. We see thirty-two vocalists from across the United States gathered in a room, growling in unison. These bits alternate with interview excerpts from the participants and producers. This promotional video was a smart marketing move and gained widespread traction online. Given that metalheads and gamers often share similar references and interests, the video has now reached over four million views.
However, this ensemble has so far existed on an ad hoc basis, for the purposes of the composer in regards to a specific commission: contrary to the others previously discussed, the Doom Eternal choir is not an active ensemble. It is also not a major component of the game’s soundtrack. If one listens to the official OST, most of the music found will be instrumental. The basis of the composition is rock music, electronic music, and sound design, with vocal interventions scattered throughout. The choir thus acts as an instrument for a larger purpose and isn’t in itself the primary medium to create. Being layered on top of heavy breakdowns, the choir doesn’t diverge very far from the voice’s usual role in a metal song. Moreover, the inclusion of metal vocalists is a testimony of video games and metal’s intersecting cultures, less so of Gordon’s commitment to developing a new type of choir. More a sound effect than an ensemble, the Doom Eternal choir is nonetheless an unavoidable piece of the puzzle when discussing the novel phenomenon of metal choirs. The future will tell if the experiment becomes standard practice in the field of video game soundtracks.
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Defining the Metal Choir
Metal Vocal ensembles are a new phenomenon, given that most of the discussed groups were founded within the last ten years. We are thus walking on uncharted territories, as no standard way of creating music for such ensembles has been fully molded. But are these ensembles even choirs? Some commenters definitely disagree: “Although there is rhythm and sound, no notes are actually being sung so I don’t believe the term choir is correct.” (commented on a Growlers Choir Instagram post). It is, in my opinion, a legitimate question as an exact definition of “metal choir” is still open for debate. But if Gospel and Jazz music have developed their own choral traditions, metal music certainly can as well.
Hellscore definitely is a choir, in the purest sense of the term. However, you’ll hardly ever hear a scream in their music, even if their repertoire is largely made of metal songs. If the vocal style changes for harsher sounds, can it still be a choir? The other ensembles discussed have very little left of choral culture in their music, apart from using notation and being led by conductors. Ensemble Tikoro‘s approach is so experimental you could easily forget that its music is being conducted. Growlers Choir occasionally becomes an ambassador of metal when working with classical singers, strengthening its ties with the choral world. But elsewhere, the group performs with microphones in an amplified context. This alone is worlds apart from the acoustic environment typical of classical singing.
Does a metal choir need to sing a capella to be considered as such? Mick Gordon’s score is essentially heavy electronic music with guitars, and the scarce vocal arrangements do not add up to full-scale choral parts. Similarly, Senécal’s music for Growlers Choir often uses backing electroacoustic tracks to accompany the singers. One could argue that here, the electronic is an analog to the piano or organ often accompanying classical choirs. Ensemble Tikoro has also incorporated instruments and other sound sources in its music.
And how many growlers does it take to form a choir? In smaller form, Ensemble Tikoro only has six vocalists. In a traditional choir, this would barely cover the four main voice sections (soprano, alto, tenor, bass). While Growlers Choir has had up to 18 singers, this number is no match for the 40+ members of Hellscore. Then again, the prospect of gathering dozens of classical singers for a choir is much more realistic than gathering the same amount of extreme vocalists. This might explain why Mick Gordon had to fly his 32 vocalists from across the United States to record in the studio. Maintaining an extreme vocal ensemble can only happen in an urban environment with a vibrant metal scene, like Bandung and Montreal. These cities are renowned for their large pools of metal fans and musicians, creating the necessary conditions for a gathering of metal vocalists to occur.
The term ”metal choir” becomes increasingly limiting as we try to define it. Perhaps, a metal choir can be any attempt to create vocal music with a group of harsh singers as the primary instrument. But while growled vocals are a discerning trait of metal, not all subgenres use it. A choir using clean vocals like Doom Birds, despite having played at Wacken Open Air, have little metal elements present in their music. Although they are metalheads singing about war and glory, the resulting music is more akin to folk hymns accompanied by an acoustic guitar. Hellscore’s ties with metal are more obvious given their repertoire. The group takes the suggested definition upside down by playing metal with a group of classical singers. Pierre-Luc Senécal questions the labels himself, as he sees Growlers Choir as “a choir of metal vocalists” more than a metal choir. Indeed, the music presented by these ensembles need not be confined to metal. For Ensemble Tikoro and Growlers Choir, the goal is precisely to use the vocal techniques of metal outside of its original context.
In attempting to define or generalize the occurrence of metal-rooted vocal groups, flexibility is key. This article has focused on what is typically conceived as a choir in eurocentric terms. However, there are countless other forms of vocal ensembles throughout the world. If one looks outside the frame of European classical choirs, the diversity of vocal expressions is puzzling. Sonically, we may as well parallel the throaty growls of metal choirs with Maori’s Haka dances, Balinese kecak, or even Sardinian Canto a tenore. Despite being rather recent, gatherings of metal vocalists share similarities with traditions much older.
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Beyond the Gimmick
Growing up, a choir made up of death metal singers was a running gag among my friends. I used to laugh about it often in rehearsal with former bandmates. I’ve also heard the idea described as “every metalhead’s wet dream”, which I’d tend to agree with. It is easy to imagine a large number of vocalists growling in unison, but the thought rarely goes further than that. To some, the concept might seem ludicrous. Something to chuckle about and quickly forget. An artistic dead-end. Even among metal fans, a choir of metal vocalists may be perceived more like a gimmick than a genuine musical venture. My experience with Growlers Choir confirms that the concept is not always taken seriously. Whatever appreciation one may have for these grunted harmonies, their existence is significant for extreme vocals at large.
For participants involved, the choral set-up strips metal vocalists from their customary band situation. It gathers numerous frontmen and frontwomen into one rehearsal space and forces them to listen to each other. Without amplification, the singers lose any tricks the microphone may have taught them. Whereas a band will allow much freedom in the vocal delivery, a choir will force all the singers to follow the conductor’s rhythm and cues. For singers accustomed to a metronomic notion of time, synchronizing to the freer movement of a musical director can be challenging. The vocal patterns are imposed and the pronunciation requirements are more rigid. There isn’t as much freedom to deform a syllable to benefit a desired pitch when clarity of elocution is required. Moreover, growlers are invited to explore neglected portions of their vocal range, namely softer dynamics. The typical reflex in a metal song is to start a vocal line with a strong attack, while in a choir you may be asked to do a crescendo and enter with a fade-in. In Growlers Choir, many had to learn how to read staff notation, a skill rarely acquired from within metal culture alone. All of us discovered new vocal possibilities by hearing everyone else’s abilities and by being asked to do atypical vocal effects. For the performer, joining a choir can expand the vocal range and further improve solo practice.
For music and the general public, choirs of metal vocalists are a golden opportunity to hear the voices so often masked by distorted guitars and fast drumming. If many people are quick to complain about the vocals in extreme metal, I personally believe that the amplification, loud dynamics, and brickwall density of the music are the true barriers for most. Metal vocals, once decontextualized and multiplied, are much more accessible and will force the listener to pay attention to the acoustic quality of the technique. It can allow skeptics to pay serious attention to harsh vocalists and their unique range. Musicians from other traditions and networks may even hear sounds compatible with their respective genres. In time, ensembles such as the ones discussed above may prove to be a catalyst in legitimizing distorted vocals to the larger public.
–Laurent Bellemare
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Header photo credit: left, Gregory Lorenzutti, middle, Pierre-Étienne Bergeron, right: Mariano R.D. Gonzalez Oliveira
