Jane Sheldon

Jane Sheldon is an Australian-American vocal performer. Her latest album is I am a tree, I am a mouth (“conceptually brilliant… a vocal and compositional triumph, beautifully realised with splendid restraint” - Limelight Magazine). The release was listed in the New Yorker’s Notable Recordings of 2022.

Praised by the New York Times for singing “sublimely”, the Sydney Morning Herald for “a brilliant tour de force”, and The Australian for “mesmerising emotional truth”, Jane has established an international reputation for highly specialized contemporary opera and art music for voice. She is an Artistic Associate at Sydney Chamber Opera.

She has worked extensively with other composers as they create new works for voice and has performed at international arts festivals such as Lincoln Center Festival, Sydney Festival, Jerusalem Sacred Music Festival, Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival, Prototype Festival, Holland Festival, Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, Resonant Bodies Festival, and Tokyo Festival. Recent performances include the Australian premiere of Mary Finsterer's Antarctica at Sydney Festival with ASKO|Schönberg and Sydney Chamber Opera, and the world premiere of Dylan Mattingly's Stranger Love for the LA Phil.

Her own body of compositional work includes electronic music, chamber music, opera installations, works for dance companies, and large-scale sound installations for museums. Described as “riveting” (New York Times) and “gripping” (Limelight Magazine), Jane’s compositions focus on the experience of altered or transformative states of being.

Upcoming shows include I am a tree, I am a mouth at New York's MATA Festival, and the world premiere of Jack Symonds' Gilgamesh for Sydney Chamber Opera and Opera Australia.

Watch/Listen

Performances made available on New York's New Sounds (WXQR):

Wild Romance by Georges Aperghis. US premiere. Performed live at the Library of Congress in Washington DC with Talea Ensemble.

King Lear: Act IV Scene 6 by Josep Sanz Quintana. US premiere. Performed live at New York's MATA Festival with Ekmeles.

For a full suite of resources about The Howling Girls, including a complete video of the work, click here.

Composing

Spectre: Three attempts to summon her (2023)

This piece was composed for Lamorna Nightingale and is composed for Kaija Saariaho, in memoriam.

The title may bring to mind Saariaho’s association with the French Spectralists, but it is really a reference to an imagined apparition. This piece is intended as a gentle ritual, undertaken to lovingly conjure Saariaho’s ghost (whatever that might mean).

A theme that recurs throughout Saariaho’s oeuvre is the way that memory and longing are full of distortion and fragmentation. In filling my own piece with distorted and bleached out fragments of Saariaho’s language, I am, likewise, trying to capture my memory of her.

The most present object from Saariaho’s music is a multiphonic from Noanoa, recorded for me by Lamorna. In the first attempt to summon Saariaho, that multiphonic is transformed and distorted and the live flute part is largely intended to gently refract and colour the harmonic terrain implied by the multiphonic, while doing not very much at all. In the second attempt, Lamorna whispers a recitation of Guillaume Apollinaire’s Il pleut, which was set by Saariaho in 1986. This poem is itself about memory and women’s voices. In the third attempt, Noanoa’s multiphonic is repeated like a refrain or a mantra of some kind, with the thought that repetition might render it a lure; her ghost might recognize something essentially hers tolling in the music, and be beckoned by it.

I’d never thought much about ghosts before.

It’s raining women’s voices as if they had died even in memory

it’s raining you, too, marvellous encounters of my life o little drops

and those rearing clouds begin to neigh a whole universe of auricular cities

listen as it rains while regret and disdain weep to an ancient music

listen to the bonds fall which hold you above and below

by Guillaume Apollinaire, translated by the composer

Spectre: three attempts to summon her was commissioned by Ensemble Offspring with the generous support of Kim Williams AM.

Eucalyptus Wind Rose derives its structure from two aspects of eucalyptus forests: first, the interwovenness of these trees with our own bodies, the essential exchange we have with forests in the form of our breath; and second, the flourishing of intense colour when the trees are in bloom. As such, the work consists of two distinct layers of sound: the first is an ambient environmental texture of breath, field recordings, and textural sound sourced from wood and paper; and the second is a garden of sonic ‘blossoms,’ responsive (via motion sensors) to the movement of visitors through the exhibition.

The textural layer is relatively austere in its absence of pitch and moves through the space, aerating it, animating it, like a breeze through a forest. The garden, in contrast, contains 28 unique pitch clusters, or ‘blossoms’, each constructed from female voice and violin pitches, and each with a fixed location in the exhibition space. As in a natural forest, in some places there is a density of blossoms, while in other zones they are distributed more sparsely.

The specific design of each blossom derives from the data represented in wind roses pertaining to the site.

The exhibition won Best Installation Design at The Australian Interior Design Awards.

Resources:

For an ABC Radio interview with curators Agatha Gothe-Snape and Sarah Rees, click here.

In Relation is a 6 episode podcast series inspired by the exhibition and hosted by curators Agatha Gothe-Snape and Emily McDaniel. The series is programmed by Rebecca Gallo, produced by Ayeesha Ash and Cara Stewart, edited by Mara Schwerdtfeger, and sound designed by Jane Sheldon. Click here to listen.

poem for a dried up river (2019)

“an assured, gripping performance that speaks to Sheldon’s mastery of atmosphere and her vocal precision…” - Limelight Magazine

“riveting” - New York Times

“stirring… like a pathway from the inanimate to the divine…” - Sydney Morning Herald

Photos: Lisa Tomasetti

poem for a dried up river is a collaboration with Elizabeth Gadsby. It was awarded Work of the Year: Dramatic at the 2022 Australian Art Music Awards.

Composer: Jane Sheldon —— Text: Alice Oswald —— Designer: Elizabeth Gadsby —— Choreographic consultant: Danielle Micich —— Lighting Design: Alexander Berlage —— Sound design: Benjamin Carey

Click here for the score.

The work has been presented at Sydney Festival by Sydney Chamber Opera, and at New York’s Resonant Bodies Festival.

British poet Alice Oswald wrote the breathless and exquisitely sonic Dunt: a poem for a dried up river after seeing a Roman figurine of a water nymph in a museum. Oswald says of the water nymph figurine: "I admire these extreme ways of invoking rain, just as I admire anyone who dares, by means of metaphor (and all language is rooted in metaphor), to communicate with something that isn’t human. If you’ve paid money for seeds or animals and you want to increase their worth by growing them on, then a water nymph is not some kind of a literary personification of water, nor is it a liquefaction of women, but it’s an effort, driven by absolute need, to make contact with something inscrutable." This piece considers the effort Oswald refers to, and explores the strange puzzle presented when a human culture requires that a small, inanimate figurine of a female form somehow manifests water.

The text is set with the kind permission of the poet.

Australian Premiere: conducted by Jack Symonds —— Sopranos: Jane Sheldon, Anna Fraser —— Trombones/Conch Shell: Matthew Harrison —— Violin: Véronique Serret —— Viola: James Wannan —— Cello: Jack Ward —— Percussion: Claire Edwardes, Bree van Reyk

US Premiere: conducted by Jeffrey Gavett —— Sopranos: Jane Sheldon, Sarah Brailey —— Trombones/Conch Shell: William Lang —— Violin: Adrienne Munden-Dixon —— Viola: Hannah Levinson —— Cello: Julia Henderson —— Percussion: Caitlin Cawley, Jessica Tsang

Earlier works

Three Mouths by Ben Quilty (2020) electronic work. This project was supported through the Australian Music Centre's Peggy Glanville-Hicks Commissioning Initiative. Click here for an essay on the work, published by ADSR.

Transformation (2017) for soprano, violin, cello, clarinet, piano, and percussion. Commissioned by Ensemble Offspring.

Passus duriusculus (2017) for soprano and piano. Created for performance with Zubin Kanga.

Testimony II: Saltair (2017) for piano quartet and electronics. Commissioned by Australia Piano Quartet.

News

PRESS

‘The singers were flawless. Jane Sheldon – much loved for the purity of her soprano, which works to perfection in baroque opera – sang the daughter… Finsterer’s music is superb. Challenging and lulling in turns, it reflects the composer’s parallel interests in music from the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, and in 20th-century serialism and 21st-century electronic techniques. One moment it is dissonantly challenging, the next it is reminiscent of meditative liturgical music from a millennium ago. The singers handle the stylistic shifts consummately, delivering the ornamentation of early choral styles especially beautifully.’ - The Monthly, January 2023 (Sydney Chamber Opera & Asko|Schonberg for Sydney Festival, Antarctica)

‘Ambitious and exquisite: Antarctica is contemporary opera at its best… Jane Sheldon’s unmistakeable, light-filled tone gives the Daughter an otherworldly clarity.’ - Sydney Morning Herald, January 2023 (Sydney Chamber Opera & Asko|Schonberg for Sydney Festival, Antarctica)

‘Mary Finsterer's heart-stoppingly beautiful new opera is endlessly absorbing, sonically and visually. The marvellous singers offer even more riches. Sheldon’s high soprano gives ethereal voice to The Daughter, nowhere more affectingly than in a shimmering ode to the Milky Way… All are superb… 4.5 stars.” - Limelight Magazine, January 2023 (Sydney Chamber Opera & Asko|Schonberg for Sydney Festival, Antarctica)

‘Remarkable soft radiance…’ - Sydney Morning Herald, June 2021 (Sydney Chamber Opera, In Song)

‘A work that resonates powerfully with the climate crisis… It’s an assured, gripping performance that speaks to Sheldon’s mastery of atmosphere and her vocal precision… A taut, affecting work, poem for a dried up river seems to teeter between despair and hope, Sheldon conjuring an ambiguous world where the only certainty is the intensity, and necessity, of the struggle.’ 4.5 stars - Limelight Magazine, January 2021 (Sydney Chamber Opera for Sydney Festival, poem for a dried up river)

‘A riveting study in breath.’ – New York Times, September 2019 (Resonant Bodies Festival, New York, USA, poem for a dried up river)

‘Singing with crystalline accuracy, impressive agility and full-voiced power…’ - The Australian, January 2019 (Sydney Chamber Opera for Sydney Festival, Kaija Saariaho’s La Passion de Simone)

‘Sheldon delivered the solo vocal line with a fluid sound of glowing pristine beauty and transcendent iridescence.’ 4.5 stars - Sydney Morning Herald, January 2019 (Sydney Chamber Opera for Sydney Festival, Kaija Saariaho’s La Passion de Simone)

‘Sydney Chamber Opera’s latest production is bold, uncompromising and musically spectacular… It’s an extraordinary vocal performance, in terms of both storytelling and technique – she has a bright and full-bodied upper register that she uses generously over the course of the piece.’ 4 stars - Timeout Sydney, January 2019 (Sydney Chamber Opera for Sydney Festival, Kaija Saariaho’s La Passion de Simone)

‘Singing at once crystalline and impassioned, plangently lyrical and passionately operatic…’ - Realtime, January 2019 (Sydney Chamber Opera for Sydney Festival, Kaija Saariaho’s La Passion de Simone)

‘Sheldon's performance was a remarkable tour-de-force – a 60-minute exploration of boundaries of vocal possibilities, maintained with remarkable tonal control.’ – Sydney Morning Herald, April 2018 (Sydney Chamber Opera, The Howling Girls)

‘Sheldon's command of pure and profane vocal sounds is remarkable. Her stamina likewise.’ – Audrey Journal, March 2018 (Sydney Chamber Opera, The Howling Girls)

‘Sheldon displayed complete command... she effortlessly executed the intervallic gymnastics required...’ – Partial Durations, September 2017 (BIFEM, with Argonaut Ensemble and Elena Schwarz)

‘Soprano Jane Sheldon turned in a stunning performance of this often scorching piece…’ - Washington Post, March 2016 (Georges Aperghis’ Wild Romance, with Talea Ensemble)

‘Soprano Jane Sheldon delivers a brilliant tour de force in the only singing role, bringing strength and gleaming purity to each of the varied four songs, chiselling out beams of vocal colour to the light rays cutting the air.’ - 5 stars, Sydney Morning Herald, November 2015 (Sydney Chamber Opera, An Index of Metals)

‘From Sheldon, we heard soft tones that were hushed, purple, quasi-onomatopoeic, and much more; we heard something closer to speech and we heard snatches of operatic vocalism…. I only wished we could have heard another performance straight away.’ – Seen and Heard International, October 2015 (Recital with Zubin Kanga)

‘Full-on vocal virtuosity, explosive wit and an overabundance of text, languages, ideas and techniques.’ – New York Times, February 2015 (John Cage's Four Solos for Voice (93-96) Avant Music Festival, New York, with Ekmeles)

‘At midpoint came the most exciting piece of the evening, Four Solos For Voice (93-96) from 1988. It was a set piece of a sort, with a spotlight often dramatically falling on soprano Jane Sheldon… Sheldon was striking, growling and shrieking…’ – The Wire, May 2015, (John Cage's Four Solos for Voice (93-96) Avant Music Festival, New York, with Ekmeles)

‘Soprano Jane Sheldon… brought mesmerising emotional truth to the performance – the skill and maturity of this remarkable young Sydney-born, Manhattan-based singer were the highlight.’ – The Australian, March 2014

‘A performance of overwhelming intensity from soprano Jane Sheldon…riveting stage presence. Vocally, Sheldon is equally compelling, her diction superb, as is her control of Kancheli’s long, long lines.’ – Limelight Magazine, December 2013

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