About Juliana

Hailed as “one of our country’s most able and prolific art song composers” (NATS Journal of Singing), American art song composer Juliana Hall has written some 60 song cycles and vocal chamber works.  Her works have been called “brilliant” (Washington Post), “beguiling” (Times of London), “strikingly original” (Austin Chronicle), and “the most genuinely moving music of the afternoon” (Boston Globe).

Musicians have called Hall’s works “positively magical” (Stephanie Blythe) and “remarkable songs – gems with both substance and beauty” (Richard Lalli).  Hall’s “beautiful vocal writing and wonderfully imaginative accompaniment” (Brian Asawa) complement her skill combining words with music; many consider her to be “one of the finest text setters writing English song anywhere” (Margo Garrett).

Juliana Hall has composed pieces for Brian Asawa, Stephanie Blythe, Gwen Coleman, Molly Fillmore, Richard Lalli, David Malis, Randall Scarlata, Dawn Upshaw, and Kitty Whately, among many others, and she has been commissioned by the vocal duo Feminine Musique, Lynx Project, Lyric Fest, Mirror Visions Ensemble, Schubert Club, and the Seattle Art Song Society.  She also received the 2017 Sorel Commission from SongFest.

More than 500 singers and pianists have performed music by Juliana Hall across the U.S. and in dozens of countries on six continents.  Her compositions are featured regularly at some of the world’s most prestigious concert venues, including the 92nd Street Y, Ambassador Auditorium, Herbst Theater, Library of Congress, Ordway Theater, Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, and Wigmore Hall.  Festival performances include the Beverley Chamber Music, Buxton International, Norfolk Chamber Music, Ojai, Orvieto Musica, Oxford Lieder, and Salisbury International Arts festivals, as well as the London Festival of American Music, Rhonefestival für Liedkunst, Schumannfest Düsseldorf, and Tanglewood Music Center.

Special concerts include the Joy in Singing’s Edward T. Cone Composers Concert at Lincoln Center in 2016, a Holy Week meditation service at London’s St. Paul’s Cathedral in 2015, and performances of songs on Dawn Upshaw’s First Songs Project at New York’s Morgan Library & Museum in 2013, as well as concerts devoted to Hall’s music sponsored by Sparks & Wiry Cries in New York in 2016, the Contemporary Undercurrent of Song Project in Princeton in 2017, Re-Sung in London in 2018, the Fall Island Vocal Arts Seminar (where she was Guest Composer in 2018) and CollabFest (where she was Resident Composer in 2018 as well), and Boston’s Calliope’s Call series in 2019.

Numerous other ensembles and organizations have presented the music of Juliana Hall, among them ÆPEX Contemporary Performance, Art Song Colorado, Boston Art Song Society, Center for Contemporary Opera, CHAI Collaborative Ensemble, Cincinnati Song Initiative, Detroit Song Collective, Ensemble for These Times, Fourth Coast Ensemble, Northwest Art Song, Oxford Song Network, Social Justice Music Factory, Société d’Art Vocal de Montréal, Song in the City, Source Song Festival, Trinity Church Wall Street, and Voices of Change.

In addition, Hall’s works have been studied and performed at more than 100 music schools including the Bard College and Cincinnati College Conservatories, Jacobs School at Indiana University, Peabody Institute, and the Eastman, Hartt, Juilliard, Longy, Manhattan, and Mannes Schools of Music, as well as both the Guildhall School and the Royal College of Music in London, the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland in Glasgow,  Fontys Conservatorium in the Netherlands, and the Conservatorio di Musica F. A. Bonporti in Italy.

Juliana Hall’s songs have been broadcast over the BBC and NPR radio networks, as well as numerous classical music radio stations worldwide, including Radio France (Paris), Radio Horizon (Johannesburg), Radio Monalisa (Amsterdam), Radio SRF2 Kultur (Zürich), WQXR New York, and WGBH Boston.  Recordings of her music have been issued independently by a variety of performers, and by labels including Albany Records, MSR Classics, Navona Records, Stone Records, and Vienna Modern Masters.

Juliana Hall’s songs are published primarily by the E. C. Schirmer Music Company, with additional publications from Boosey & Hawkes and NewMusicShelf.