<div><p>From Farinelli, the eighteenth century castrato who brought down opera houses with his high C, to the recording of "Johnny B. Goode" affixed to the Voyager spacecraft, <I>Let Me Clear My Throat</I> dissects the whys and hows of popular voices, making them hum with significance and emotion. There are murders of punk rock crows, impressionists, and rebel yells; Howard Dean's "BYAH!" and Marlon Brando's "Stella!" and a stock film yawp that has made cameos in movies from <I>A Star is Born</I> to <I>Spaceballs</I>. The voice is thought's incarnating instrument and Elena Passarello's essays are a riotous deconstruction of the ways the sounds we make both express and shape who we are—the annotated soundtrack of us giving voice to ourselves.</P> <p><B>Elena Passarello</B> is an actor and writer originally from Charleston, South Carolina. She studied nonfiction at the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Iowa, and her essays have appeared in <I>Creative Nonfiction</I>, <I>Gulf Coast</I>, Slate, <I>Iowa Review</I>, <I>The Normal School</I>, <I>Literary Bird Journal</I>, <I>Ninth Letter</I>, and in the music writing anthology <I>Pop Till the World Falls Apart</I>. She has performed in several regional theaters in the East and Midwest, originating roles in the premieres of Christopher Durang's <I>Mrs. Bob Cratchit's Wild Christmas Binge</I> and David Turkel's <I>Wild Signs</I> and <I>Holler</I>. In 2011 she became the first woman winner of the annual Stella Screaming Contest in New Orleans.</P></DIV>