Meaghan Burke

"There is something terribly wrong with calling Meaghan Burke a songwriter. Like vodka, the more you question the effects, the blurrier they become. Meaghan Burke is not an artist whose musically over-educated past is a primer for making marketable pop music. Her sound embraces the odd nuances contained in love affairs with free improvisation, lingering music school sadism, a career geographically split between New York and the Vienna intelligentsia. Meaghan sings jazzy, approachable melodies over cello accompaniments that channel every possible incarnation of Western music all at once. It's impossibly beautiful but in no way forgiving. Her fingers race in preparation of cadenzas and the orchestration seems totally unrelated to what pours out of her mouth. ... Because what she's created is too personal, too direct and unusual to claim she's a songwriter - which sounds categorically absurd but it's true – it's like she's a songwriter, imploded.”

-- Valerie Kuehne, The Deli NYC

Full review at: http://nyc.thedelimagazine.com/6483/experimental-nyc-meaghan-burke-sidewalk-cafe-on-0812 (8-12-2011)