Beatie Wolfe


Beatie Wolfe is an Anglo-American award-winning, pioneering singer-songwriter known for "seeing music differently" and creating new tangible formats for albums in the digital era.. These musical innovations, which include a Space Broadcast via the Holmdel Horn Antenna and the world's first live 360 AR stream, have gained Wolfe critical acclaim with the Victoria and Albert Museum inviting Wolfe to exhibit her 'world first' album designs in a solo exhibition; the Barbican Centre commissioning a documentary on Wolfe's work; Wired featuring Wolfe as one of 22 changing the world and UN Women selecting Wolfe as one of nine innovators for a global campaign for International Women's Day. In January 2020, Wolfe received the She Rocks Innovator award alongside Suzi Quatro, Gloria Gaynor, Linda Perry and Tal Wilkenfield.
Wolfe is also the co-founder of a "profound" research project looking at the Power of Music for people living with dementia and in March 2020 gave a TEDMED talk about the power of music as medicine and her work in the field.

Early life

Wolfe was born in Sands End, South London, to an English mother and American father. She attended the Young Blood Theatre group at the Riverside Studios between 2000 and 2004 where she wrote and performed in a number of plays at the Riverside Theatre and Lyric Theatre. Wolfe attended Ibstock Place School from age 3 to 16. Following Ibstock, she attended Goldsmiths, University of London where she studied English Literature. For her dissertation, Wolfe wrote about Canadian singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen, which she received a first for and it was subsequently published online. This led to her musical interpretation of Cohen's poem "Thousand Kisses Deep" and correspondence with Cohen and his team.

Early music career

On 10 – 12 November 2007, Wolfe was invited to play the Jack Kerouac Festival at the Marquee Club alongside American performers Carolyn Cassady, Saul Williams and David Amram. David Amram, who declared Wolfe to be "the Baroness of bob", invited the London singer songwriter to perform at his residency night at the Cornelia Street Cafe in New York. On 7 April 2008, Wolfe performed her first of several New York shows with Amram at Cornelia Street Cafe, alongside The Sopranos star John Ventimiglia. She also performed at New York clubs Rockwood Music Hall, The Living Room, Pete's Candy Store and on East Village Radio a residency with Punchdrunk's theatre show Sleep No More.

''Burst'' EP (2010–2011)

Wolfe's debut EP, Burst was released in January 2010 as an iPhone App as was one of very few artist apps available. GQ Magazine reviewed the launch concert at St Pancras Old Church as "the best concert been to all year."
In July 2011, Wolfe performed at Secret Garden Party in Huntington. In August 2011, she was selected by EMI and Roundhouse to be featured in its 30/30 compilation album. This was released in December 2011 on Roundhouse Records. In August 2011, Wolfe shared the bill with American jazz musician Wynton Marsalis at Ronnie Scott's Jazz Club. Following the show, Wolfe and Marsalis became friends and he became an important musical influence and mentor.

Debut album ''8ight'': 2013 – 2014

In July 2013, Wolfe released her debut album 8ight as a vinyl, lyric book and 'world's first' 3D interactive album app which British GQ premiered in its magazine, online and via its app, titled "Beatie Wolfe enters a new dimension: How folk's sultry songtress gave depth to her debut album." The album was positively reviewed by GQ as "updating traditional sounds with themes from modern life... she enraptured us with her smoky, captivating melodies about love and loss." It was also positively reviewed by Monocle as "Beautiful, it's hitting me like lovely records do" and Wolfe appeared on the front page of the Archant's Ham&High with a double album page review, which described 8ight as: "Raw, brooding and so diverse it features everything from spongy bass to ukuleles, the record is an irresistible collection of melodious three-minute pop nuggets."

''8ight's'' Innovations

Wolfe's "world’ first" format was positively received by various critics such as Wired magazine who described it as an "ingenious 3D layered view that beautifully brings to life her captivating folk sounds" and British GQ magazine who stated that Wolfe "continues to innovate with her beautiful new album 8ight". Several magazines noted that Wolfe was "the first artist to introduce Palm Top Theatre to her product".

''8ight'' Tour

Following her 3D Interactive App release, Apple Inc. invited Wolfe to perform at its worldwide flagship event theatres – London, New York & Berlin – to present her App in a live interview and perform tracks off her album 8ight. Live interviewers included Spin and Billboard editor & chief Craig Marks, GQ's commissioning editor Charlie Burton and Debug Founder Sascha Kösch.
Prior to the US tour for 8ight, Wolfe appeared on Monocle 24's Review Show to talk about the influences behind the album, which coincided with a review in Monocle Mediterraneo 2013 summer publication. In September 2013, Wolfe performed a US tour including headline shows in San Francisco, San Diego, LA, New York and Boston. UK tour performances included The Stables in Buckinghamshire, Hare & Hounds in Birmingham and 606 Club in London. European performances included Hamburg's Nochtspeicher, CeBIT in Hanover and the Berlin Kurfürstendamm theatre. In November 2013, Wolfe was invited to present her App and perform at Wired's creative salon in Old Street. Her "8" App was later reviewed in January 2014's Wired Insider, as a highlight of the night.

Album Lyric Book – Words of ''8ight''

On 19 February 2014, at Mayfair's Maggs Bros Ltd on Berkeley Square – one of the longest-established antiquarian booksellers in the world – Wolfe launched the first edition of 'Words of 8IGHT', her lyric book to accompany the album.

Album: ''Montagu Square'': 2015 – 2016

Wolfe's second album Montagu Square was conceived and recorded at 34 Montagu Square – the former home of Jimi Hendrix, Ringo Starr, Paul McCartney, John Lennon & Yoko Ono – and the album's single "Take Me Home" was recorded in the room where McCartney wrote ‘"Eleanor Rigby" & Hendrix penned "The Wind Cries Mary."
Montagu Square received positive reviews with The Independent newspaper calling the album "absolutely gorgeous" and praising Wolfe for being a "pioneering songwriter", Forbes calling it "extraordinary," The Huffington Post highlighting its "strong percussive sound with a bluesy overtone" and praising its "refreshingly low fi and honest" sound and Monocle Magazine describing the album as: "pure and simple; a short, sharp flip-it-over-and-listen-again LP of well-made, expertly played, beautifully sung chamber pop."
Following Montagu Square's release, Wolfe was nominated for Google Play Music's "Best Digital Artist" alongside the 1975.

''Montagu Square's'' Innovations

Musical Jacket

Following on the innovations of 8ight, Montagu Square was released as a woven album jacket made by legendary tailor Michael Fish. Wolfe recorded the album at 34 Montagu Square, Marylebone, the former home of Jimi Hendrix, Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, John Lennon & Yoko Ono and in the room where "The Wind Cries Mary" and "Eleanor Rigby" had been written. Wolfe's live recording – complete with its ambient sound, resonance of the room – was translated into a woven fabric and cut by tailor Michael Fish as the first Musical Jacket of its kind. The Jacket has been NFC-enabled, allowing people to hear the music by tapping their phone onto the fabric. Wolfe's jacket has been featured in the Evening Standard, Craft Magazine, Creative Review, Huffington Post, Wired, Forbes, Recode, The Next Web, Tech Crunch and Fast Company. Tech Crunch called the Musical Jacket "spectacular" and praised Wolfe for "making music physical again, in a very literal way."
Wolfe has told the story of her Musical Jacket at Digital Life Design in Munich alongside Arianna Huffington; at Apple HQ's Steve Jobs Theatre in Cupertino; at an audience with Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II in Liverpool; at South by Southwest and in the Victoria and Albert Museum alongside David Bowie's designer Jonathan Barnbrook for the 'Records and Rebels' exhibition.

NFC Album Deck

In addition to the musical jacket, 'Montagu Square' was released as the world's first NFC Album Deck in collaboration with MOO. The Next Web called this release "a brilliant inspiring idea that transcends novelty" and Wired called it "bleeding edge." The Montagu Square album deck comes as a pack of printed cards with each card corresponding to each track off the album and featuring artwork, lyrics and an embedded Near field communication chip – allowing listeners to tap the song cards onto their phone to play the music and access its content. The Montagu Square Deck was previewed at London's Serpentine Gallery.

Album: ''Raw Space'': 2017

Wolfe's third album Raw Space was conceived at Bell Labs' Anechoic chamber, cited in the Guinness World Records as the quietest room in the world. The album features
"Little Moth", a song written in tribute to singer songwriter Elliott Smith and described by Spindle Magazine as "a tender homage with the intimate double vocals, distant mellotron and all round low-fi sound, very much in the spirit of Smith’s style and production." Highsnobiety named Wolfe as one of '10 Ways Music Will Change in 2017.'
Raw Space was released in May 2017 and reviewed positively by BBC Radio 4 who called it "delicious", KCRW who called it "raw, gritty and honest", Jazziz who praised the song arrangements for having echoes of George Martin, New Scientist who described it as "intimate, like the sound of secrets whispered under bed covers," and Nathan Brackett who called it "amazing" and made it an Amazon Music album of the month. It also featured on Bayerischer Rundfunk, BBC Radio 2, Hoxton Radio, XETRA-FM.

''Raw Space's'' Innovations

Live 360 AR Stream

Responding to the streaming age of music becoming the principal way of listening and continuing her approach of trying to reunite music in the digital age with a sense of tangibility, ceremony and storytelling, Wolfe released Raw Space as the world's first live 360 AR stream in collaboration with Bell Labs and Theo Watson's design company, Design I/O. This was a first in the world for combining live, 360˚ stereoscopic video and real-time AR visuals, creating a modern, Fantasia-like live streamed album experience. In an interview with Hoboken Life, Wolfe described the thinking behind Raw Space:
Raw Space touches on the themes I’ve been exploring since my first album but in perhaps the most extreme and technicolor way. For this album, it began with a question. What would the anti-stream of today look like? With Raw Space, I wanted to create the antithesis of our current streaming experience and really celebrate the world of the album—it’s artwork, arc, narrative, music—in a fully immersive and multi sensory way, which has the effect of placing the listener at the centre of this dynamic world.
The live stream started on 5 May 2017 and ran continuously for 7 days straight. A turntable physically played Wolfe's album Raw Space on repeat from inside the Bell Labs' Anechoic chamber while people logged on via YouTube to listen to the music and explore the room in 360-degree video with the Augmented reality animation bringing the album's artwork, lyrics and visual landscape to life in real-time for the viewers. The Augmented reality animation was also part-generative, which meant that with every spin the visuals would evolve and listeners might experience different things. The Raw Space live stream was given high praise by TechCrunch, Axios, Fast Company, Wired and New Scientist, who described it as "like walking around in a dream someone had made for me" and the BBC Radio 4 called it "transformative" and "an extraordinary production: music and visuals" for "operating in this liminal space between online and offline." Raw Space was featured in YouTube's 'Best of 360.'
Live, generative AR performance
In addition to the live stream, Wolfe also pioneered the world's first live, generative Augmented reality performance for songs "Little Moth" and "As You" as part of the launch of Raw Space. This was achieved by using kinect's motion-sensing devices, designed for Microsoft's Xbox 360 games console, to track Wolfe's movements in the chamber and allow the Augmented reality animation to respond to her specific location in real time. New Scientist described this as "an enchanting effect," with the song's lyrics streaming out of her mouth as her sung and the graphics following her round the room in real time.

Raw Space galactic broadcast

On 26 September 2017, Wolfe broadcast her album Raw Space into space via the Holmdel Horn Antenna and with the assistance of Robert Woodrow Wilson. Robert Woodrow Wilson made an update to the horn to ensure Wolfe's music got past the earth's atmosphere and into space, making this the first music broadcast into space using the Holmdel Horn Antenna.

Experiments in Art and Technology collaborator

Wolfe's Raw Space sits under the umbrella of Bell Labs Experiments in Art and Technology, a 50-year-old collaborative program which began in October 1966 with. Wolfe is one of the first 21st century collaborators joining the likes of past participants John Cage, Andy Warhol, Robert Rauschenberg. Bell Labs president and Nokia CTO Marcus Weldon said the program had "attenuated" over the decades, but he's hoping to kickstart it by working with Wolfe.

Philanthropic work

Power of Music and Dementia

Power of Music & Dementia is a philanthropic collaboration between Wolfe and The Utley Foundation. Wolfe was inspired by the work of neurologist Oliver Sacks and his book Musicophilia to begin this project after family members became inflicted by the condition. The Power of Music & Dementia research project was the first recorded study to look at new music for people living with dementia. Wolfe's study has been described as "ground-breaking" and "profound" for testing music unconnected to memory and has been endorsed by the American Alzheimer's Association and Stanford University. The Power of Music research tour ran for 4-months between November 2014 and February 2015 and Wolfe performed her original music at Priory Group care homes across the UK while responses were monitored, both during the live performance and in the weeks following as the patients listened to the same songs on headsets. The findings, which included a significant improvement in communication and memory, were published in May 2015 and received positive press from The Times, Independent, Guardian, BBC Radio 4, and Wired as the first study to both test and show the benefits of new music.
Wolfe has presented about 'Power of Music & Dementia' at TEDMED, WIRED's Conference, Digital Life Design, UCSD, Royal Institution, Social Innovation Summit, the American Alzheimer Association, in a televised interview for Stanford University "Of Sound Mind" and Sky News. Wolfe's song "Need Somebody" was inspired by this dementia project. Wolfe also collaborated with Punchdrunk on their Greenhive Green as the musical artist for the installation.
Power of Music & Dementia was turned into the UK charity Music For Dementia 2020 with the aim of getting music in all UK care homes. Wolfe is an ambassador for the charity.

Awards, patronage and nominations

Wolfe's style has been described by The Huffington Post as "low fi and honest" indie rock with a "strong percussive sound and bluesy overtone" and by Monocle as "expertly played, beautifully sung chamber pop." Praised by GQ for her "smoky captivating melodies that envelop the listener in tales of love and loss" Wolfe's music pulls from the brooding poeticism of Leonard Cohen, the tender intimacy of Elliott Smith and occasionally veers into Americana and grunge territory. Wolfe's live performance has been hailed as "absolutely breathtaking" by The New York Times Magazine and "a profound delivery of depth and soul" and Wolfe has been described as a "beguiling, excellent live performer."
Wolfe influences include: "Donny Hathaway’s vocals, James Brown’s sass, Nina Simone’s soul, Tom Waits’ grit, Leonard Cohen's words, Stevie Wonder's melodies, Brian Wilson's harmonies, Otis Redding's feeling, The Beatles’ versatility, John Lennon's honesty, Rick Rubin's production and Elliott Smith's everything."

Discography

Albums

''Raw Space''

Released: 5 May 2017
SongTrackLengthWritten By
Little Moth103:55Beatie Wolfe
The Man Who205:25Beatie Wolfe
Pure Being304:06Beatie Wolfe
Gimme Some Love404:26Beatie Wolfe
Oh Darling504:45Beatie Wolfe
Broken Bird605:03Beatie Wolfe
As You703:54Beatie Wolfe
How Can I804:24Beatie Wolfe
---Beatie Wolfe

''Montagu Square''

Released: 26 October 2015
SongTrackLengthWritten By
Set Her Free102:56Beatie Wolfe
Battleships203:54Beatie Wolfe
From Green To Red304:27Beatie Wolfe
Take Me Home404:13Beatie Wolfe
This Love504:38Beatie Wolfe
Simply Friends603:20Beatie Wolfe
To Be Saved705:38Beatie Wolfe
Need Somebody804:29Beatie Wolfe
---Beatie Wolfe

''8ight''

Released: 1 July 2013
SongTrackLengthWritten By
Lied103:05Beatie Wolfe
Make it Up203:05Beatie Wolfe
Never Ever302:59Beatie Wolfe
Too Lovely403:28Beatie Wolfe
Danger Blue503:12Beatie Wolfe
Thinking For Two603:18Beatie Wolfe
Could She Be703:18Beatie Wolfe
Beautiful Affair803:52Beatie Wolfe
Lied Bonus03:25Beatie Wolfe

EPs

''Burst EP''

Released: 1 January 2010
SongTrackLengthWritten By
Beautiful Affair103:40Beatie Wolfe
Burst204:54Beatie Wolfe
11:07304:11Beatie Wolfe
It Will All Fall404:08Beatie Wolfe
As You503:24Beatie Wolfe

Singles

Videos

Apps