Singer-songwriter and ethnomusicologist Juliane Jones finds harmony in what seems like self-identity dissonance. “I occupy a middle space – my world is about intersections,” the New York-based songstress explains. Juliane’s father is Welsh, and her mother is from LA. She has lived internationally in five different places and speaks fluent Chinese and French. She is an ethnomusicologist, producer, and songwriter.
Juliane’s new experimental Chinese songwriting project integrates traditional Chinese music genres of guqin, pipa and xiao music, Chinese opera, and Buddhist chant into Western popular music idioms. It pushes the boundaries of performance by blending languages, timbres, and concepts in a way that is conscious of the stakes of translation and appropriation. Based on research begun during a Fulbright fellowship in China, Juliane’s songs and instrumental tracks are a celebration of cultural understanding.
Live Performance, Moon Festival 2014:
When You Sleep (Official Music Video) from last album The Space Between the Telephone Lines: