This is a small sampling of a larger compilation project between composer-performer Jasper Sussman and sound engineer Conor Barry. Vocals are performed and recorded by Jasper, and manipulated in Ableton by Conor.

My Heart Falls

Jasper Sussman, marimba and voice
arrangement by Jasper

Poet's Song - Aaron Copland

FOMA Ensemble, recording session at the Madison Media Institute (MMI), 2015

Performers: David Pedersen, Jasper Sussman, and Molly Wells
(David, center; Jasper, right; Molly, left)

Mumble Outbounds

Performance History

Madison Choral Project, Lutheran Church of the Living Christ, Madison, WI, December 20, 2015
Madison Choral Project, First Congregational United Church of Christ, Madison, WI, December 18, 2015

Text
From Renderings of Hafiz, by Daniel Ladinsky

One day the sun admitted,
I am just a shadow.
I wish I could show you
The Infinite Incandescence
That has cast my brilliant image!

I wish I could show you,
When you are lonely or in darkness,
The astonishing Light
Of your own Being!

My Brilliant Image

Commissioned by the Admiral Launch Duo, Jennifer Ellis (harp) and Jonathan Hulting Cohen (saxophone), this piece explores the expressive qualities of various ex-tended techniques for both instruments.

Performance History:
Kerrytown Concert House, Ann Arbor, MI, January 14, 2016
Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, November 15, 2015
Kalamazoo Piano Company, Kalamazoo, MI, November 8, 2015
The Hartt School, Hartford, CT, October 18, 2015
Bezanson Hall, Amherst, MA, October 17, 2015
Carl B. Taylor Auditorium, Schenectady, NY, October 15, 2015
Hotel Whitcomb, San Francisco, CA, April 10, 2015
STAMPS Auditorium, U of Michigan, Ann Arbor, April 20, 2014

...nice box! "Oh So Square"

Buzzz

Etude Practice

Etude Practice 2

Inhales

Laugh

Monstrous

Yodel

FOMA Ensemble, practice recording: taken while rehearsing the idea of short complete musical improvisations

Performers: David Pedersen, Jasper Sussman, and Molly Wells

FOMA Enters a Room

Vocals, Jasper Sussman
Bass & Vocals, David Pedersen

Jamming on some of David's bass riffs together for the first time.

Artwork by Livia Fălcaru
https://www.facebook.com/lfillustration/
http://lf-illustration.tumblr.com

Don't Cry (improv)

Vocals, Jasper Sussman
Bass & Whistles, David Pedersen

Jamming on and around a bass riff of David's for the first time together.

Lose Myself

A Bigi Ba

FOMA Vocal Ensemble
Members: David Pedersen, Jasper Sussman, and Molly Wells

This track was recorded at MMI Studios in Madison, WI. The sounds were primarily produced by various hands making various types of contact with a wooden floor.

floor play

FOMA Vocal Ensemble
Members: David Pedersen, Jasper Sussman, and Molly Wells

Lullaby

human

This is the complete audio from David and Jasper's show on WSUM Student Radio 91.7, aired live and recorded on October 30, 2015.

Db & Jasper on WSUM 91.7 Madison Student Radio

Hear D. Jasper Sussman talk about her piece "Work", an a cappella choral work that discusses her experience as a female composer. The conversation is between Jasper and WSUM host and contemporary musical artist Emili Earhart.

D. Jasper Sussman WSUM 91.7 Interview 4/21/17

Madison Choral Project
April 23, 2017, 3pm
First Congregational Church, Madison, WI

Program Notes:
I have never identified as a feminist. It'd be impossible, however, for me to remain ignorant of the clumsily uneven climate of our world, and certainly of this country. Work: What Choice? is my first concert work featuring a self-written text, but instead of just telling my story, it is an attempt at telling a common story shared by many. This daunting objective resulted in a painstakingly delicate creative process and an overly precise score wrought with ambiguous messages. Have you ever noticed how similar flirtation can sound to taunting, how alike a concerned outcry of warning can be to a parroted command, or how easily understanding can be misconstrued as pity (and vice versa)? This piece is not designed to convince, complain, or coerce. It is meant only as one perspective, one voice in the conversation asking to be heard.

Work: "What Choice?" - D. Jasper Sussman | MCP

Vocal Etude (intro)

Compilation Track - FOMA Ensemble

Common interests, goals, and camaraderie brought Alexandria and me together in the making and performance of "mother woke me (wake me)," a piece featuring unusual and vulnerable sonic qualities on trumpet and voice within an electronically produced environment. Our goal in working together was to explore and discover a model of unconventional collaboration that reconstructed the roles of performer and creator and questioned the ideal environment in which excellent artistry occurs. 

In the making of the piece, Alexandria and I chose to eliminate the roles of composer and performer, instead adopting a democratic system not dissimilar to a rock band’s. Our creation process involved embodied improvisation, notational experiments, movement explorations and thoughtful communication around ideas of personal history and identity, aesthetics, and individualized working styles. Additionally, we drew from ideas of Affect Theory, a theory often applied to theatrical and visual art, Stanislavsky’s Method (also theatrical), and the Japanese dance form butoh to foster an embodied performance practice rooted in emotional intensity. We found that discovering a clear emotional trajectory, aided by internalized stories and textual material, created an intensified experience of connection to each other and to our material. As Stanislavsky explains it, “Inside of you, parallel to the line of physical actions, you have an unbroken line of emotions verging on the subconscious. You cannot follow the line of external action sincerely and directly and not have the corresponding emotions” (1936, p. 329). This intensity of emotion, its vulnerability, is what led us to our unusual timbres, our graphic and instructional score, and our personalized story behind the piece built from experiences of pain and that pain’s relationship to acceptance and personal power.

mother woke me (wake me)

Sail

Commissioned by Bert Pinsonneault for the Madison Chamber Choir
Recording of C3LA, Directed by David Harris

I keep coming back
to that dog
running west
next to the fast lane
along the concrete meridian 
between eight
lanes of traffic

and wishing
I could have stopped although it was impossible 
four lanes of us
nose to tail
seventy miles an hour

that dog, thin, grey 
loping doggedly along 
no Samaritan in sight 
nowhere to go but on

Catherine Jagoe

Dog on the Median of the Kennedy Expressway, Chicago

Text by Zoë Delaney Fluger
Commissioned and performed by Marinette High School Choir, Marinette, WI

Performance History:
Marinette High School, Marinette, WI, April 22, 2010

Little Bird

Troubairitz for soprano and percussion (2010)
Composed by Tansy Davies

A song cycle based on 12th century ‘Provencal’ poems by women troubadours, the troubairitz, translated by Derek Mahon with acknowledgements to Meg Bogin and Sarah White.
1. What I Write Now 
2. Secret Wishes
3. Since I Refused
4. Beloved Friend
5. Now He Is Gone 
6. Winter
7. I Walk alone

Performance Recording by Jasper Sussman, May 5, 2019.
Featuring Movements 3, , 5, 6, and 7.
Christopher Clarino, percussion

Troubairitz (2010), by Tansy Davies

Un bel di, vedremo from Madame Butterfly
Composed by Giacomo Puccini

Performance recording by Jasper Sussman, May 5, 2019.
Mari Kawamura, piano

Un bel di, vedremo - Puccini

Translating emotion into intentional expression, whether it be delicately notated or spontaneously voiced, is at the heart of JASPER SUSSMAN's interest in music. As a collaborative composer, performer, educator, and improviser, she strives to promote emotional awareness and growth, compelling the questioning of perception and the breaking down of expectation. 

Inspired by artists Meredith Monk, Theo Bleckmann, Bobby McFerrin, Tanya Tagaq, and Paul Botelho, Sussman spent much of the last two years exploring raw and vulnerable vocal timbres. She has started to write her first opera, based loosely on Joseph Campbell’s The Hero’s Journey. Additionally, Sussman is working on a set of vocal etudes designed to demonstrate the bounds of the female voice. 

As the Madison Choral Project’s first composer-in-residence, Sussman is writing two new choral works for the talented group’s upcoming season. Her past works span from collaborative dance pieces, such as her work Dionysian Sea, commissioned by choreographer Marlene Skog and featured at the World Dance Alliance—Americas in Honolulu this past summer, to orchestral works like her piece Baguettelle which received 2nd place in the Austin Civic Orchestra Composition Competition in 2014. Sussman received her master’s degree in music composition from the University of Michigan where she studied with Stephen Rush, Kristin Kuster, Evan Chambers, and Erik Santos. She received her bachelor’s from Lawrence University studying under Joanne Metcalf, Asha Srinivasan, and Fred Sturm. She is an alumna of the Atlantic Music Festival, the National Puppetry Conference, and the Brevard Music Center, and has worked with composers Melissa Dunphy, Kevin Puts, Ken Ueno, Robert Patterson, Mari Kimura, Michael Harrison, and Robert Aldridge. She is a member of PASIC, ASCAP, the College Music Society, and the American Composers Forum. Her works are published by Bachovich Music Publications.

Sussman currently resides in St. Louis, MO where she sings with the St. Louis Symphony Chorus. She has a private coaching practice focusing on the connection between music, creativity, and wellness.

Jasper Sussman

Popular tracks