Composer, writer, vocalist, and cellist Merlin Coleman has created projects and productions ranging from a gargling chorus to a layered work about a local quarry’s environmental degradation.
Influenced by performance art and experimental vocal music, Merlin weaves together field recordings, sound poetry, movement, film, text, and theater. Melting pianos, unraveled stories, harmony-filled songs, environmental sounds, vocal experimentation, and absurdism are through lines in her work. Her current compositions focus on the illumination of personal stories related to climate change induced events.
Her evening-length work EXPLORATIONS of EXTRACTION and DECAY premiered at The Audium in San Francisco in 2023 where it continues to run intermittently. In 2025, she formed an ensemble of six singers under the direction of Kelly Atkins of the Kitka Women’s , Vocal Ensemble to perform her new work DISPATCHES from the CHARCOAL FOREST due to premier in May of 2026.
