Juliet Fraser


Juliet Fraser is a British soprano, based in London and specialising in new music.

Education

Fraser studied at the Purcell School and at the University of Cambridge, where she read Music and History of Art. Initially an oboist, she began her vocal training at the age of 21, combining private lessons with freelance performing.

Early career

In 2002, Fraser co-founded the vocal group EXAUDI with James Weeks and was Executive Director of the group until 2014. She remains one of the core members. She was a member of the soloists of Collegium Vocale Gent from 2007-2012, performing and recording Renaissance polyphony by Orlande de Lassus, Tomas Luis de Victoria, Carlo Gesualdo and William Byrd. She also sang with British choirs such as Polyphony, Tenebrae, the Monteverdi Choir and BBC Singers.

Contemporary music

Fraser is best known as an interpreter of contemporary classical music. Her repertoire focuses on new works for solo voice, voice and tape/electronics, voice and piano, and voice and ensemble. She has performed as a soloist with Klangforum Wien, Ensemble Modern, , Asko/Schönberg|Asko|Schönberg, Remix, We Spoke: New Music Company and Plus-Minus. She is co-director of the recording label , alongside and Newton Armstrong. Fraser is also founder and Artistic Director of eavesdropping, a concert series and symposium that celebrates women in new music.

Collaborations with composers

Notable collaborations have resulted in new works written for Fraser by Matthew Shlomowitz, Andrew Hamilton, Bernhard Lang, Michael Finnissy, Rebecca Saunders and Cassandra Miller. In 2016, she premiered Lang's The Cold Trip, part 2 at MaerzMusik in Berlin and Finnissy's Andersen-Liederkreis at Transit festival in Belgium, both with pianist Mark Knoop.
In the same year, Rebecca Saunders wrote Skin for Fraser and Klangforum Wien; it was premiered at the Donaueschingen Festival and performed again at the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival. Fraser was described as sounding "positively alien at various points, adding unsettling frissons to our perception of the nature of the voice". The premiere recording of this work appears on the Donaueschingen-released recording from that year. Fraser also gave the world premiere of O Yes & I with flautist Helen Bledsoe at the Louth Contemporary Music Festival in June 2018, the UK premiere of O for solo voice in BBC Radio 3's series in September 2018, and the UK premiere of Yes with Ensemble Musikfabrik at the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival.
Since 2016 she has been collaborating with Canadian composer Cassandra Miller, resulting in an ongoing and modular series of compositions called Tracery.'' This project had its first outing at Cafe Oto and subsequent iterations have been programmed by Experimental Sound Studio Chicago, Klangspuren Schwaz and Bastard Assignments.

Recordings

Her 2016 recording of Morton Feldman's Three Voices appears on Hat Hut Records. The album was nominated for a Schallplattenkritik prize. In 2017 she released a recording with pianist Mark Knoop of Bernhard Lang's The Cold Trip, part 2, a "reimagined Winterreise", on Kairos. 2018 saw releases of Andrew Hamilton's To The People on NMC, Michael Finnissy on Hat Hut and a download-only binaural recording of Milton Babbitt's Philomel on all that dust.