The Swingles have been challenging the boundaries of vocal music for over 60 years, earning 5 Grammy® Awards and establishing themselves as one of the world’s most beloved and admired vocal groups.
Throughout its various iterations, the group’s signature, instantly recognizable sound has remained constant and timeless, and its intricate arrangements remain unparalleled.
The current singers are masters of their craft, constantly seeking new ways to reimagine jazz, folk, pop and classical music from their ever-growing repertoire, while also creating a rich vein of original material. Their combination of close-miked amplification, paired with the extraordinary range and vocal dexterity of the group’s seven individual voices, creates one seamlessly blended vocal sound that has captured the admiration of composers and collaborators alike, who have embraced the sheer versatility of the group and its genre-crossing possibilities.
American-born Ward Swingle first assembled a group of Parisian session singers to sing through Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier as a vocal exercise in 1962. The resulting album ‘Jazz Sebastian Bach’ (recorded initially for friends and family), became a huge hit, breaking new musical ground and launching The Swingles to fame. Several of the singers had previously sung with Mimi Perrin’s group Les Double Six (who, with Quincy Jones and Dizzy Gillespie, recorded the 6 voices twice in order to create a much larger sound and richer chord structure). The Swingles of today employ a similar technique in their current shows – an immersive layering up of vocals using live-looping technology to record themselves in the moment and have it play back later, producing mesmeric (and potentially massive) musical textures.
The group has released more than 50 albums spanning a wide range of music and styles, fuelled by Ward Swingle’s pioneering spirit and varied musical tastes. Their arrangements tend either to give the original a little twist or to turn it completely on its head. The group’s genre-inclusive approach to music-making has led to collaborations with artists such as Jamie Cullum, Gareth Malone, Kurt Elling, New York Voices, and Labrinth. They co- wrote and performed a song for the end credits of Alexander Payne’s film ‘Downsizing’ and have appeared on many film and TV soundtracks, including ‘Grey’s Anatomy’, ‘Sex and the City’, ‘Wedding Crashers’, ‘The Holdovers’, ‘The Two Popes’, and ‘Glee’.
The group’s latest album ‘Theatreland’ (a spectacular celebration of some of the greatest musical theatre songs as you’ve never heard them before) was released in 2024.
Revered experimental composer Luciano Berio was one of the first composers to explore the sound of The Swingles’ amplified voices in an orchestral setting with his ground-breaking “Sinfonia”, first performed in 1968. The work has become something of a postmodern cult classic among orchestras across the globe, with The Swingles rightly recognized as the original and leading interpreters of the highly demanding vocal parts. Notable recent performances include those with the San Francisco Symphony (with Michael Tilson Thomas), the ORF Vienna Radio (with Marin Alsop), the London Philharmonic Orchestra (with Vladimir Jurowski), and the Orchestra of La Scala, Milan (with John Axelrod).
In 2024, The Swingles commissioned a major new work, “The Gorgeous Nothings,” by Anna Clyne and performed the world premiere at the BBC Proms to critical acclaim. Having had such an immersive heritage in experimental electronic vocal music, they are excited at the possibilities of the Augmented Orchestra and the sheer sonic potential of this new work.
