Gelsey Bell

Gelsey Bell is an American singer, songwriter, actress, and experimental composer-performer. Raised in northern California, she comes from an artistic family: her father is a philosopher, her mother is a musician, and her sister, Biba Bell, is a choreographer and dancer. The siblings collaborated on a joint performance for the first time in 2016. Bell earned a BA with a double major in music and theatre and a minor in philosophy from Lehigh University in 2004, then pursued graduate study at New York University, where she completed a PhD in Performance Studies in 2015. She has also published several pieces of performance studies scholarship.

Bell's musical practice centers on experimental composition and performance, encompassing solo albums, operas, song cycles, and improvisational works. She frequently breaks the fourth wall in live settings. Earlier in her career she released singer-songwriter albums including Under a Piano (2005), February (2008), and In Place of Arms (2010). In 2007, she joined thingNY, a New York collective of experimental composer-performers, which has produced three concert-length operas: This Takes Place Close By, ADDDDDDDDD, and Time: A Complete Explanation in Three Parts. Bell co-founded a second collective, Varispeed, in 2011, an ensemble known for durational performances of works by Robert Ashley and John Cage. In 2012, she wrote and premiered Scaling, a song cycle presented at the Vital Vox Festival that incorporated unconventional piano techniques, including Bell lying atop the instrument while singing and playing. That same year she released a live recording of the piece. Her album Ciphony, created in collaboration with composer John King, documented their work with Compagnie CNDC-Angers and Robert Swinston in restaging Merce Cunningham's EVENT, and featured Bell's use of voice, vocoder, and metallophone.

Bell's theatre work began in earnest with Natasha, Pierre, & the Great Comet of 1812, an electro-pop opera adapted from War and Peace by composer Dave Malloy. She did not audition for the production; Malloy invited her to its initial workshops at Ars Nova Theater having written a role with her in mind, and her vocal abilities shaped the opera-within-an-opera section of the musical. Bell portrayed Mary Bolkonsky from those early performances through the production's Kazino run and into its 2016 Broadway opening, which marked her Broadway debut. She has described Great Comet as her first genuine acting job, noting that most of her prior theatrical work allowed her to perform as herself rather than inhabit a character.

Bell also worked with Malloy as a member of the original cast of Ghost Quartet, serving additionally as co-arranger and performing vocals, metallophone, Celtic harp, accordion, and percussion. She remained with the production as it toured venues across the United States. In 2014, she performed in Crash, the final opera of composer Robert Ashley, a work written specifically for Bell and her Varispeed colleagues and performed entirely a cappella with four voices sounding at any given moment. That same year, Bell appeared as a featured vocalist in River of Fundament, an operatic film by Matthew Barney with composition by Jonathan Bepler. In 2015, she collaborated with Erik Ruin on Prisoner's Song, a piece examining life in prison through music, imagery, and recorded testimonials from former convicts; Bell and Ruin also created a related art installation exhibited at Eastern State Penitentiary. Bell has additionally collaborated on operas with composers Kate Soper and John King, and has worked with choreographers Kimberly Bartosik and Yasako Yokoshi. In January 2023, she presented her evening-length work mɔɹnɪŋ [morning//mourning] at HERE Arts Center as part of the Prototype Festival.

In 2017, Bell received a sound/music grant from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts. She has also received residencies and commissions from the Jerome Foundation, and her work Bathroom Songs was included in MoMA PS1's Greater New York exhibition in 2015.