JEN SHYU
JEN SHYU
Jen Shyu ("Shyu" pronounced "Shoe" in English, Chinese name: 徐秋雁, Pinyin: Xúqiūyàn) is a groundbreaking, multilingual vocalist, composer, producer, multi-instrumentalist, dancer, 2025 Rome Prize Winner, 2019 Guggenheim Fellow, 2019 United States Artists Fellow, 2016 Doris Duke Artist, and was voted 2017 Downbeat Critics Poll Rising Star Female Vocalist. Born in Peoria, Illinois, to Taiwanese and East Timorese immigrant parents, Shyu is widely regarded for her virtuosic singing and riveting stage presence, carving out her own beyond-category space in the art world. She has performed with or sung the music of such musical innovators as Sumi Tonooka, Nicole Mitchell, Val Jeanty,Ikue Mori, Linda May Han Oh, Anthony Braxton, Wadada Leo Smith, Mark Dresser, Francis Wong, Jon Jang, Vijay Iyer, Tyshawn Sorey, Kenny Barron, Reggie Workman, Bill Frisell, and Immanuel Wilkins. Shyu has performed her own music on prestigious world stages such as Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Brooklyn Academy of Music, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rubin Museum of Art, Ojai Festival, Ringling International Arts Festival, Asia Society, Roulette, Blue Note, Bimhuis, Salihara Theater, National Gugak Center, National Theater of Korea and at festivals worldwide.
Even with the acclaim she has received for her recordings, Shyu is just as renowned for her dynamic performances. Ben Ratliff wrote in The New York Times that her concerts are "the most arresting performances I’ve seen over the past five years. It’s not just the meticulous preparation of the work and the range of its reference, but its flexibility: She seems open, instinctual, almost fearless." Her duo performance with Tyshawn Sorey was among The New York Times’ Best Live Jazz Performances of 2017. Larry Blumenfeld wrote in the Wall Street Journal that “her voice, a wonder of technical control and unrestrained emotion, tells a story dotted with well-researched facts and wild poetic allusions. She claims both as her truths.”
Currently based in New York City, Shyu is a Paul Simon Music Fellows Guest Artist and is co-founder with Sara Serpa of M³ (Mutual Mentorship for Musicians), a radical model of mentorship for women, non-binary, and underrepresented composer-performers around the world. She premiered her last solo work Nine Doors in 2017, kicking off a 50-state U.S. tour of “Songs of Our World Now / Songs Everyone Writes Now (SOWN/SEWN),” planting seeds of creativity and threading communities together through art and cultural exchange. She’s currently touring her third solo production Zero Grasses commissioned by John Zorn across all 50 states and has received wide critical acclaim for her latest album Zero Grasses: Ritual for the Losses, with “When I Have Power” on Nate Chinen’s “Best Songs of 2021” list for NPR. Jen is a renowned educator and has moved her teaching studio to her Patreon since the start of the pandemic. Jen Shyu is a Steinway Artist.
Her current instruments in performance include piano, violin, Taiwanese moon lute (2 strings), Chinese er hu (2 strings), Japanese biwa (4 strings), Korean gayageum (12 strings), Korean soribuk (drum), and Korean gong called "ggwaenggwari."