Academy

Jack Sheen is a conductor and composer from Manchester, recognised for his inventive approach to music-making, which blends orchestral traditions with an expansive interdisciplinary perspective. His own music spans orchestral and chamber compositions, installations and site-specific spatial performances, cultivating a compositional understanding in his interpretations of core repertoire that have been praised for their precision and insight.
Sheen has conducted some of the world’s leading orchestras (including London Symphony Orchestra, BBC Symphony Orchestra, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, BBC Philharmonic Orchestra and London Philharmonic Orchestra), as well as contemporary music specialists such as Lucerne Festival Contemporary Orchestra, Ensemble 10:10, Bit20 Ensemble, London Sinfonietta and Klangforum Wien. Equally he is at home in opera and has collaborated on interdisciplinary projects with leading visual, dance and experimental music artists, including Matthew Barney, Cerith Wyn Evans, Burrows & Fargion, and Elaine Mitchener. In 2024 he co-directed London Sinfonietta in a rare live performance of Beckett’s "Quad" at Southbank Centre, paired with Feldman’s "For Samuel Beckett". As co-director of London Contemporary Music Festival he has curated sell-out events across the capital that bring together internationally established and grass-roots artists from a wide range of disciplines in programmes hailed as "adventurous and provocative" (The New York Times) and "vastly ambitious and massively popular" (The Daily Telegraph).
As a composer, Sheen has been commissioned and had works performed by many of the orchestras and ensembles he conducts, alongside commissions from eminent arts organisations such as Venice Biennale, Casa de Serralves in Porto, and London’s V&A and Camden Art Centre. Recent projects include "Lag", a spatialised orchestral piece commissioned by BBC SSO and Ilan Volkov for Tectonics Festival; "Press", a piano quintet commissioned by Wigmore Hall and Apartment House; and "Ceremony Container", a spatialised performance commissioned by Ensemble Mosaik and Berlin’s Silent Green. Awards include Ernst von Siemens Foundation Progetto Positano Residency (2024), PRS Composers Fund (2021), Arts Foundation Fellowship (finalist, 2020), Royaumont Voix Nouvelle Composition Prize (2018), Royal Philharmonic Prize for Composition (2016), an RNCM Gold Medal (2012) and BBC Young Composer of the Year (2011). In 2019 he was a Jerwood Fellow with Manchester International Festival.

His music has been broadcast internationally, and released on labels including LSO Live, The Trilogy Tapes, Black Truffle, SN Variations, and NMC.

 

jacksheen.com