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BIOGRAPHY​​​​

JAMIE MAN/ 文珮玲 uses the forms of opera, live performance and dark room installations to create works primarily concerned with music and the poetic mystery of the transtopian body.

Outrenoir I, II, III and V are a series of live dark-room installation-performance works  inspired by the black canvases of french artist Pierre Soulages exploring the different ways that darkness can allow us to see.  Using auditory illusions, infrasound and visual phenomena such as physiological after-images created with light, the works were commissioned by Ensemble Xenon (Berlin, 2018), London Symphony Orchestra (2019), San Francisco Symphony (2022) and Sonotomia with Festival Terras sem Sombra using 4DSOUND (Alentejo, 2022).

四/Shi for voice and violoncello with text by 伊藤晴雨/Itō Seiu and various Japanese death poems was commissioned by the pioneering Nōh artist, Ryoko Aoki (Tokyo, 2017). In 2021, continuing their collaboration, Jamie created ZELLE: Wenn es Dunkel Wird as Director/Composer with writer Peter Stamm; a multi-lingual opera in Japanese, German, Ukrainian, music, light, water and darkness. (LOD Muziektheater, Gent with Theater- und Musikgesellschaft Zug, deSingel Antwerp, Asko|Schönberg Ensemble Amsterdam, Palau de les Arts Reine Sofia, De Munt / La Monnaie Bruxelles, Festival Aix-en-Provence and Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation Lisboa).

Other large-scale works include PLAY: Episodes in Subspace (Gulbenkian Music Foundation Lisbon, 2016), Filth and Ecstasy (Ballet de l'opera du Rhin, 2021), DARK SKIES with Blixa Bargeld (Asko|Schönberg Ensemble, Slagwerk Den Haag, Holland Festival, 2023) and Connaissez-vous le cri du Chocard? for Orchestra, light and darkness, commissioned by l’Orchestre de Chambre de Paris and Théatre du Châtelet (Paris, 2020) supported by the Franco-British fund Diaphonique.

As a conductor, Jamie continues to work internationally conducting premieres of her own work as well as those of other living composers. Highlights include Les Enfants Terribles by Philip Glass (Arcola, UK premiere), The Transmigration of Morton F. with music by Anat Spiegel (La Monnaie, Brussels/ Holland Festival, Amsterdam), recordings of music by Frank Denyer for the label Another Timbre (UK) and The Blue Woman (Royal Opera House, London) by Laura Bowler directed by Katie Mitchell.

INTERVIEWS AND LINKS

2025 /// Interview with Milo Rau ahead of the world premiere performance of ETUDE #1616D at Wiener Festwochen.
2024 /// CONNAISSEZ-VOUS LE CRI DU CHOCARD? Shortlisted for the British Section of ISCM World New Music Days 2025

2023 //// Article for the release of ORPHANS OF THE COSMOS/ 宇宙孤兒 on NMC records
2022 //// Interview with Culturplaza as ZELLE becomes  the first opera by a female composer to be performed at Palau de les arts, Valencia (ES)
2022 //// World premiere of Connaissez-vous le cri du Chocard? now available to view on Youtube
2021 //// SHI/四 released on CD「夜の詞 Yoru no Kotoba」'WORDS OF THE NIGHT' (JP)
2021 //// Interview on the creation of ZELLE for ENOA (EN)
2020 //// Feature in Le Magazine de l'Ochestre de chambre de Paris, Janvier 2020 | issue no. 3 (FR)
2020 //// Feature in TCHÂT,  Le journal du Théâtre du Châtelet #02 (FR)
2019 ////  Podcast Interview for ENOA with Saskia De Ville (EN) 
2019 ////
Review of GEBURT protest walk-outs in Tonnehalle Düsseldorf, review [Westdeutsche Zeitung, Germany] (DE)
2019 ////  Review of GEBURT in Berlin [Deutschlandfunk, Germany] (DE)
2019 ////  Interview at London Symphony Orchestra for OUTRENOIR II (EN)
2018 ////  Interview on workshop for WHITE RABBIT with LOD Muziektheater (EN)
2017 ////  Feature on SHI/四 for Ryoko Aoki  [VOGUE magazine, Japan] (JP)
2016 ////  Artist spotlight article for European Network of Opera Academies Festival d' Aix-en-Provence (EN)
2015 ////  Workshop for NO DEVIL LIVED ON with Mahogany Opera Group (EN)

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