La Suspendida LIVE
by KILTER - ANDROMEDA ANARCHIA - GROWLERS CHOIR - SEVEN)SUNS - William Berger
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Interlude: Innocence LIVE
00:00
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02:13
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Streaming + DownloadIncludes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.Purchasable with gift cardDownload available in 16-bit/44.1kHz.
€9 EUR or more
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ShirtJazz Metal Opera "La Suspendida" T-Shirt by Kilter!ships out within 7 daysedition of 30Purchasable with gift card
€25 EUR or more
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Record/Vinyl + Digital AlbumAn Opera in Jazz and Metal for Female Soloist and Chorus
La Suspendida dares to give voice to Maria Elena that transcend
victimhood, positing her as the agent of her own unique destiny.
Includes unlimited streaming of La Suspendida LIVE via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.Download available in 16-bit/44.1kHz.ships out within 7 daysPurchasable with gift card€50 EUR or more
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Full Digital Discography
Get all 6 KILTER releases available on Bandcamp and save 20%.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of La Suspendida LIVE, The Suspended Woman, AXIOM REVISITED by Patrik Schwitter, SYS, AXIOM, and KILTER (EP).
Purchasable with gift card€31.19 EUR or more (20% OFF)
1. |
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2. |
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Limbo: A Place with No Weather (Solo, María Elena)
I don’t hate this place
It’s not Cuba, or Florida
Not hot, not cold
No weather at all
In my body, yet free from it
I never loved my body much
It always felt like someone else
It’s starting to feel right at last
Right here, right now, at last
Adios old world, old ways
Marriage, home, family
I sense a new love here. Now
Outside of time
Unlike any love there’s ever been
I revel in the pleasure
And let go of the pain
In this new land, that is no land
This place between realms
This place with no weather
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3. |
Interlude: Arrival LIVE
03:51
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Interlude: Arrival
Come from afar,
Foreign lover,
Though I be unalive
Cross the great line,
Drench me,
That I be not all dead
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4. |
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Laudes Mortuorum & Roll Call of the Newly Dead (Chorus)
Morning comes.
shhh
Morning comes to the eastern shore.
shhh
Reveal the shadows gathered there.
The newly dead of the Americas await
our summons across the sand.
Arise.
Arise, Shades.
Arise, Shades.
Fall in the parade as single tears.
Augment the ocean of perpetual death.
Arise, Shades.
You must obey.
We know not of light or time.
You who still do must pass through.
Come! Come, we will teach you
the timeless ways of this land.
Come shed your name, your clock, your pain.
Come shed your name, your clock, your pain.
Kiko da Silva, Rio de Janeiro, 17, knife wound.
Hattie May Johnson, Norfolk, 89, loneliness.
Ryan O’Malley, New York, 46, heart attack.
Kwe’Tshito of Kanawahkee, 52, frozen.
Come shed your name, your clock, your pain.
Come shed your name, your clock, your pain.
Maria Elena Milagros, Key West, 21, tuberculosis...
Maria Elena Milagros, Key West, 21, tuberculosis.
ALL SHADES MUST COMPLY!!!!
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5. |
A Decision LIVE
02:21
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6. |
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The Ballad of María Elena (Solo, María Elena)
Thank you so much… I hate to be rude
Not choosing one or the other
But I have the means to choose something new
I even got help from my mother
As for me...
I won't listen to your rule book
As for me,
I'll just stay here in this place eternally
Eternally
Cuba was my home but I chose to roam
My husband decided to leave me;
Our child was born dead I sought out instead,
a homeland that would not deceive me
As for me,
I don't stay where I don't want to
You can see
I went to Key West
Doctor Tanzler was obsessed
Obsessed with me, living, dying then lifeless
He did me then,
He does me now
And I’m kind of liking it like this
As for me,
I’ve created quite a system
I can be
In control in life and death and in-between
I like it here,
The in-between tier
In this limbo locale with no weather
Tanzlers’s living lust,
In this cunt of dust,
Means I can stay here forever
As for me
I’ve got myself a husband
Who loves me as I am
As I am, not how he thinks I should be
Mama does my hair and make-up up there
Then he fucks the corpse that he attended
I vibe with his vibe I gladly imbibe
The essence that keeps me suspended
As for me
I don’t need to join your chorus
As for me
I can live here in control eternally
I know it’s odd
I know we’re not a typical pair
Quirky and young
His perv intentions cross cosmic dimensions
No other man is so well hung
As for me
I’m not merely in a coma
I’m alive!!
After dying way too young I plan to thrive!
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7. |
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Arguments at the Gates of Death, Part 1: You can’t drag me through your gate (Tutti)
Chorus:
They don’t exist,
Venus, Ishtar
There are no Goddesses of Power…
Only human fear of us,
the dead.
María Elena:
You say he loves my corpse
Because he fears death,
but I don’t care
I know that nothing can bring me back to life
But as long as I get his fresh seed,
You can’t drag me through your gate
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8. |
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Interlude: Innocence
Come from afar,
Foreign lover,
Though I be unalive
Cross the great line,
Drench me,
That I be not all dead
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9. |
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Arguments at the Gates of Death, Part 2: You don’t remember what flesh is (Tutti)
Chorus:
If Love is a god, then so is Time
A god with the power to bring all here
María Elena:
You don’t know shit if you believe
That Time’s a stronger god than Love.
How many lovers have loved beyond death?
Didn’t Thelma and Louise love into the abyss?
Didn’t Tristan and Isolde grow trees
That intertwined above their graves?
Chorus:
They died together
They were equal
Their love did not inhabit separate worlds
María Elena:
But others did. And you allowed it!
Victoria shaved Albert’s statue everyday
Shah Jahan’s dead wife lies in
the world’s finest monument!
People travel far and wide to
behold how much he loved her.
Pornography in marble!
Chorus:
They loved with souls, not flesh
Much less did they mingle flesh and dust
María Elena:
You don’t remember what flesh is
Flesh is pure, even when decayed
It’s only the soul that sins
You don’t remember what flesh is!
Chorus:
It cannot be
It will not pass
The tests of science and morals
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10. |
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Song of the Countess (Solo, María Elena)
María Elena:
I tell you it is, and if you must know,
Why don’t you ask the old Countess,
Back there behind your gates?
Or can’t you find her?
Can’t you tell one from another?
Chorus:
At night, all cats are gray
María Elena:
Well I can tell her story myself,
Tanzler told me enough times
He said she was his grandmother,
But I doubt it
All men think they’re noble
The Goddess of Love is a fraud and a bitch
Ruling the world as a whore divine
With a thousand faces and a name for each
And I am her slave, as you, Sir, are mine
She’s Venus, Ishtar, Freia, Rati
But worse than you know – she’s also a thief
She makes people want what’s not theirs to take
And lust for those things that only bring grief:
Caligula fucked his old granny
And Xerxes fell in lust with a tree
Pasiphaë chose a bull as a stud,
To name but the worst from antiquity.
All may refuse and reject her decree
Yet all are controlled by her sway;
They may well object or they might agree
All that results is that all will obey.
Now I bring you a gift from the Goddess,
Something that’s never before even been.
Won’t you be pleased to be forced to commit
An awesomely twisted original sin?
We’re sending to you a passion unique
A lust more perverse than a bull or a tree…
You’ll love a woman who doesn’t exist
Yet owned by a mistress who’s yet to be.
We’ve probed your most secret dreams
And according to these we’ll craft her
And her flesh will be yours to love
Forever and ever, then evermore after
Now I bring you a gift from the Goddess
Something that’s never before even been.
Won’t you be pleased to be forced to commit
An awesomely twisted original sin?
And her flesh will be yours to love
Forever and ever, then evermore after….
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11. |
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12. |
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Arguments at the Gates of Death, Part 3: The hypocrites of the light (Tutti)
Chorus:
If sex and love are one
Then your man sins twice
Against the God of Time:
he fucked you
both before birth and after death
he fucked you
María Elena:
Didn’t my first husband do the same?
He left me when I bore a corpse.
Our stillborn child was the death of his future,
His failure, his first death of many
Chorus:
A sin against nature
A sin against time
A sin against love
María Elena:
Everyone does this…
Don’t you see?
Every time they buy stock,
or plant a tree
It’s fucking the future
To dodge Death’s decree.
In the dimension of Love,
Time has no sway.
Either it’s love,
or it just fades away
Chorus:
Fucking a corpse is a sin
María Elena:
Everyone fucks the dead,
You self-righteous prigs
Chorus:
Fucking a corpse is a sin
María Elena:
Everyone fucks the dead,
You self-righteous prigs,
No better than us
And far less forthright.
Chorus:
Your sin is greater
María Elena:
Tell me again
How much you all love
Princess Diana,
poor Marilyn Monroe
La Divina Callas –
Can you let them rest, at last?
Chorus:
Your sin is greater
You upend all that is.
Your sin is greater
María Elena:
And isn’t that Lenin I see
Over there, in this limbo
Chorus:
You are desperate
María Elena:
He is not buried yet
Suspended
Adored by his few
Remaining devotees
Chorus:
You are merely desperate
María Elena:
And let’s not even talk
About Christ, you freaks…
Whom you never let rest
As you get on your knees
And beg Him to return
Chorus:
You are desperately
clinging to life
By a phallic thread
Let go
María Elena:
It’s only a sin now
Because a woman calls the shot
Chorus:
Let go
María Elena:
That’s when the living speak
Of sin and perversion
And crimes against Nature.
I see the dead
Are no better than
The hypocrites of the Light.
I’ll show you my power
I’ll make you watch
So you have to admit
Your hypocrisy
Your hatred inspires me
To new heights of love.
I’ve never felt stronger
Or sexier then now
I declare
I declare
I declare my body
My own,
And this body
Will be obeyed!
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13. |
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My Corpse, Your Dungeon (Solo, María Elena)
Chorus:
{sounds of revulsion}
Vile! Vile! Vile!
María Elena:
My corpse, your dungeon… Right?
You love me, tho I’m dead inside
I’ll let you, tho you haven’t died
My corpse, your dungeon… Right?
I triumphed, the first time I died
I’d die twice if you were not inside
Chorus:
It reeks of life
It reeks of life
María Elena:
Obey me, my thrall
And love me once more
But way more than before
I’ll embrace my power
And make the dead watch it all
A show of compliance…
Hold my pale fragile sheath
Above you… Crawl beneath,
Surrender your manhood
To my act of defiance
Thus I command, my Drone,
Do what you’re good for
But harder and more,
So I can reign solely
In this realm of my own.
My corpse, your dungeon… Right?
You love me, tho I’m dead inside
Chorus:
Sin against nature and Time
María Elena:
I’ll let you, tho you haven’t died
My corpse, your dungeon… Right?
I triumphed, the first time I died
Chorus:
You cling to life!
María Elena:
I’d die twice if you were not inside
Chorus:
You must let go
María Elena:
Water my dust bowl
With your devoted seed
The one thing I need,
More than ever before,
In my cold alpha hole
Confess what you crave!
Let all the dead see.
You’re nothing without me,
Unsung and forgotten,
Except as my slave
Now give it all here,
Fuck with your whole life,
Your dominant wife
Now needs to blast off
To the next stratosphere
My corpse, your dungeon… Right?
You love me, tho I’m dead inside
I’ll let you, tho you haven’t died
My corpse, your dungeon… Right?
I triumphed, the first time I died
I’d die twice if you weren’t inside
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14. |
Interlude: Climax LIVE
03:03
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15. |
Afterglow LIVE
04:02
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Afterglow (Solo, María Elena)
Where am I now?
I got here… how?
Seems like the same spot…
But, then again, not
I haven’t moved…
But everything feels
Transfixed,
Transformed
Changed
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16. |
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Double Call: Laudes Mortuarum Reprise and Finale (tutti)
Maria Elena:
Why? Why? Why? Why?
Why must I hear, why must I hear,
Must I hear them, I hear them still!
I wish I had music
To drown out their sound.
Chorus :
Morning comes
Shhh
Morning comes to the Eastern Shore
Shhh
Reveal the shadows gathered there,
The newly dead of the Americas,
Await our summons across the sand
Maria Elena:
Why can’t I block them out?
Chorus :
Arise, Arise, Shades!
Arise, Shades!
Fall in the parade,
As single tears
Augment the ocean
of perpetual death
María Elena:
I wish I could fuck
Louder than last time
And not have to hear
The choir of the dead.
Chorus :
Arise, Shades! Arise
Suzy Kowolski, 56, Asbury Park… Car crash
María Elena:
Their song wears me out!
Tanzler, come back…
Chorus:
Elgin McKay, 24, Kingston… gunshot
María Elena:
Tanzler, come back…
Come serve me again
As big as last time.
Chorus :
Raúl Rossi, 47, La Plata… cancer
María Elena:
Fill my dark, dank womb
With your seed of light,
Chorus:
Catalina Pérez, 16, Veracruz… Died in childbirth
María Elena:
Keep me suspended
Between two worlds
Chorus:
Carl Tanzler, 75, Key West…
María Elena:
Dead? Dead?
Tanzler is dead?
He can’t help me now.
Is there another
Who’d answer the call
To a body like this?
All men are quitters,
All men are shadows,
All men make chaos,
Then vanish below
All men leave me,
All men deceive me,
No man is sure,
No man is my cure,
They couldn’t save me there,
And they won’t save me here.
Chorus:
Come, Tanzler,
also called Doctor,
and Count von Tanzler;
Cause of death: Heart attack during sex… with a corpse
María Elena:
Fucking a corpse!
A cause of death
That’s a final joke
The ultimate lay,
His final day
Sex so intense
It’s a capital offense
But how can I stay here
If he’s no longer up there?
I don’t want to die yet,
And be part of a crowd…
The dreary masses
Of dull gray shades.
I died once already
Too soon: never again!
Let no borders hold me!
I fly above them.
I am the unique one,
Created by magic,
To exist before birth
And persist after death.
I am La Suspendida,
The genre of One!
Chorus:
María Elena Milagros, Key West, 21, tuberculosis
María Elena:
My name… again…
Chorus:
María Elena Milagros, Key West, 21, tuberculosis
María Elena:
No more Tanzler
Chorus:
No more necro
María Elena:
No more Body
Chorus:
No more sickness
María Elena:
No more living
Chorus:
No more prayers
María Elena:
No more loving
Chorus:
No more memories
María Elena:
No more messages
From the living world
Nothing left
To pretend I’m alive
Nothing more
To keep me afloat
Chorus:
Daughter, daughter, daughter
Come home
María Elena:
I thought I cheated life and death
And found my own space
Between kingdoms
Where I alone ruled
But that was a dream.
I didn’t want to need him,
To whore my corpse…
I only wanted to take control
Of my own life,
Of my own body,
My own fate.
When I dared to rise over him
From my position below,
Was that moment “love”?
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17. |
Lullabye LIVE
07:20
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Lullabye (Tutti)
Chorus:
Come, come
It’s ok to expire
Come, come
Once your goal is won
Come, come
You can join the choir
Come, come
Once your solo’s done
María Elena:
Mother, true mother
Not countess, nor she
Who once gave me birth
But all cradle Earth,
I’ve craved you so long
But I didn’t know how to come home
As victor, not victim,
Let me lie among you
Let me rest at last
I’ve craved you so long
But now I know how to come home
Yes, yes, yes
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about
La Suspendida rewrites the tragic story of María Elena to give her the dignity that was robbed from her and making her the protagonist of her own destiny.
Whenever the case of Dr. Tanzler and María Elena has been depicted, the focus was on the perpetrator, and María Elena was always portrayed as a passive victim – in both life and in death.
La Suspendida subverts this paradigm, moving the focus away from Dr. Tanzler and putting the spotlight entirely on her.
Opera, an ode to the human voice, is a platform for that which is too large for life. It strives to connect the supernatural with the mundane, and is the right medium for Maria Elena's post- mortem narrative. The story of her journey through the limbo between life and death to healing, to her chosen, peaceful home, leaves no one in the audience untouched. Maria Elena blossoms, gives herself the love and attention she desires, and enjoys being all that she can be as a woman.
She not only sings about her new destiny, but also addresses the audience – all humanity – demanding the right to dignity and self determination. From this perspective, Dr. Tanzler is stripped of the power he once had over her and is relegated to the periphery of Maria Elena's life.
What is after her death is now belongs to her alone, and she holds all the power and creative agency for herself.
The form of opera itself has a tradition of empowering women beyond the surface level reading of the plots - the physical qualities of the strong, high female voice made the "diva" (literally, “goddess”) an essential element of the art form despite the many barriers to women appearing on world stages. It is significant that "opera singer" is considered the first career in the Western world in which women made independentfortunes - antedating even dramatic stage stars. This history is both explicitly acknowledged in La Suspendida and inherently embedded in the structure of a female soloist contending with all thevoices of the Eternal Void.
Whenever the case of Dr. Tanzler and María Elena has been depicted, the focus was on the perpetrator, and María Elena was always portrayed as a passive victim – in both life and in death.
La Suspendida subverts this paradigm, moving the focus away from Dr. Tanzler and putting the spotlight entirely on her.
Opera, an ode to the human voice, is a platform for that which is too large for life. It strives to connect the supernatural with the mundane, and is the right medium for Maria Elena's post- mortem narrative. The story of her journey through the limbo between life and death to healing, to her chosen, peaceful home, leaves no one in the audience untouched. Maria Elena blossoms, gives herself the love and attention she desires, and enjoys being all that she can be as a woman.
She not only sings about her new destiny, but also addresses the audience – all humanity – demanding the right to dignity and self determination. From this perspective, Dr. Tanzler is stripped of the power he once had over her and is relegated to the periphery of Maria Elena's life.
What is after her death is now belongs to her alone, and she holds all the power and creative agency for herself.
The form of opera itself has a tradition of empowering women beyond the surface level reading of the plots - the physical qualities of the strong, high female voice made the "diva" (literally, “goddess”) an essential element of the art form despite the many barriers to women appearing on world stages. It is significant that "opera singer" is considered the first career in the Western world in which women made independentfortunes - antedating even dramatic stage stars. This history is both explicitly acknowledged in La Suspendida and inherently embedded in the structure of a female soloist contending with all thevoices of the Eternal Void.
credits
released May 30, 2025
Produced by Laurent David
KILTER - Composition
Ed RosenBerg III: Bass Saxophone
Laurent David: Electric Bass
Kenny Grohowski: Drums
Libretto
William Berger
Andromeda Anarchia - María Elena
Dramatic Growloratura Soprano
Growlers Choir - The Choir Of The Dead
Pierre-Luc Senecal:Conductor, director
Maude Théberge, Marie-Claude Fleury, Corinne Cardinal, Jeff Mott, Samuel Arseneau-Roy, Laurent Bellemare - Growls, Screams and Whispers
SEVEN)SUNS
Earl Maneein: Violin
Adda Kridler: Violin
Sarah Zun: Viola
Jenny DeVore: Cello
Recorded and mixed by
Antoine Delecroix
Mastering
Fred Kevorkian (Brooklyn, NY, USA)
Light Show
Mathieu Derothe-Renaud
Artwork
Julie Castro-Grohowski
Logos
Peurduloup
Libretto translation
Anne-Pierre Hocquet
Concert recorded in
Le Forum (Vauréal, France)
November 16th, 2023
Full Album Running Time: 83mn
Produced by Laurent David
KILTER - Composition
Ed RosenBerg III: Bass Saxophone
Laurent David: Electric Bass
Kenny Grohowski: Drums
Libretto
William Berger
Andromeda Anarchia - María Elena
Dramatic Growloratura Soprano
Growlers Choir - The Choir Of The Dead
Pierre-Luc Senecal:Conductor, director
Maude Théberge, Marie-Claude Fleury, Corinne Cardinal, Jeff Mott, Samuel Arseneau-Roy, Laurent Bellemare - Growls, Screams and Whispers
SEVEN)SUNS
Earl Maneein: Violin
Adda Kridler: Violin
Sarah Zun: Viola
Jenny DeVore: Cello
Recorded and mixed by
Antoine Delecroix
Mastering
Fred Kevorkian (Brooklyn, NY, USA)
Light Show
Mathieu Derothe-Renaud
Artwork
Julie Castro-Grohowski
Logos
Peurduloup
Libretto translation
Anne-Pierre Hocquet
Concert recorded in
Le Forum (Vauréal, France)
November 16th, 2023
Full Album Running Time: 83mn
license
all rights reserved
tags
about
KILTER Brooklyn, New York
Kilter is an instrumental metal-jazz trio inspired by the unrelenting hustle and
grind of New York
City.
Founder and bassist Laurent David (Folterkammer, G. Perret, I. Maalouf) teamed up with drummer
Kenny Grohowski (Imperial Triumphant, John Zorn) and saxophonist Ed Rosenberg
III (Jerseyband, Heart of Barf) to create a daring and spontaneous work of avant-
garde metal
... more
discography
-
May 2025 -
Nov 2023 -
Oct 2022 -
Jun 2021 -
Feb 2020 -
Dec 2018
contact / help
KILTER recommends:
-
Ed's Jazz metal Band
go to album -
Laurent's bass solo album
go to album
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