Saturday’s performance in Finney Chapel was less like a concert and more like a retelling of ancient creation stories. The storyteller was acclaimed singer, composer, dancer and filmmaker Meredith Monk. While Monk has won numerous awards for her work in several media, her performance in Finney focused solely on her virtuosic vocal abilities. From the very beginning of her performance, it was clear that Monk’s music could not be understood and evaluated through classical music theory; those who were looking for her to play by the rules of a particular genre or medium discovered that Monk’s work shatters all such distinctions.

Monk’s compositions, with their loping, repetitive style, combined with her voice, which was capable of creating a universe of sound, evoked a sort of anthropological Esperanto. In the first part of her performance, especially in her selections from Songs From the Hill (1976) and Volcano Songs (1994), Monk conjured up visions of primal, prehistoric life that were intensely spiritual and evocative of an earlier time. The songs, which consisted of wordless sounds like hooting, humming and hissing, seemed to recall a world before humans; a swampy domain populated by dragonflies and microbes. The repetitive, rhythmic songs resembled rituals or prayers, and their allusion to a primordial world naturally lent itself to a religious feeling.

While most of Monk’s first set dwelt in this oozing, primordial realm, the second and third parts of her performance seemed to progress through history while maintaining a primitive feel. “Travelling” (1973) and “Madwoman’s Vision” (1988), for example, added piano accompaniment to Monk’s voice. In both compositions, there was a sense of interaction and conversation between multiple people. The concert reached its climax in the final section of Monk’s performance when she shared the stage with singer Katie Geissinger.

The development from Monk’s isolation in the beginning to the final partnership with Geissinger makes the later songs entirely collaborative. In a piece entitled “Hocket,” Geissinger and Monk constantly exchanged two note fragments.

After attending Monk’s lecture earlier in the week and watching her perform on Saturday, Monk remains an enigma in my mind. Even with my minimal knowledge of vocal technique and music theory, I can see that what Monk has done in music and continues to do as her artistic career unfolds does not fit readily into preconceived notions of what music is. The experimental nature of her work makes it hard to appreciate, yet her compositions are totally honest. The songs remind me of voices in dreams — you can’t make out any words, yet the conversation makes sense. Ultimately, the minimalist aspect of Monk’s music makes it resonate with the listener in a basic way and in doing so, makes her performance thrilling and worthwhile.