ABOUT
Lunr Girl is the stage name of Keira Madsen, an electronic musician, producer, and performer currently based in so-called Vancouver, Canada (the stolen lands of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tseil-Waututh nations). She creates immersive danceable ambient music, where semi-intelligible vocals drift in and out of the foreground in various ways: as sustained notes and harmonies, staccato rhythms and accents, textures with heavy delay and reverb, snippets of spoken sentences, or chopped-up incoherent words. Keira is inspired by the rhythms of Four Tet (Kieran Hebden) and the dreamy techno pop vocals of Kelly Lee Owens.
Keira grew up improvising on her family piano, played cello and bass clarinet in school bands, and sang in her high school jazz choir. However, it wasn’t until early 2020 when she started in the New Media + Sound Arts program at Emily Carr University of Art & Design that Keira realized she could take her love of improvisation on the piano and translate it into making music in a DAW.
Lunr Girl/Keira created her first CD in May 2023, a compilation of 14 songs made over the last two years. These songs will be released on streaming services as singles over the course of the next year. Not only has Keira developed as a musician since 2020, she has grown as a performer as well. In her earlier sets, her goal was to perform her songs as close to the arranged version as possible. Since January 2023, however, she has been exploring long-form improvisational performance that only incorporate snippets of her arranged songs. These are more reminiscent of DJ sets, lasting anywhere from 30-50 minutes. She is excited by how the improvisational space allows for increased playfulness and unpredictability, and creates a sense of immediacy between the performer and the audience. Besides playing live shows, Keira’s focus is currently on making a music video to accompany her first official release.