Dana Jessen is a bassoonist, improviser, and electroacoustic musician whose original compositions, improvisations, and collaborative work have been met with critical acclaim. A recipient of the 2023 Cleveland Arts Prize and hailed as a “bassoon virtuoso” (Chicago Reader), Jessen’s distinct voice and musical language have positioned her as a pioneer of contemporary and improvised music on the bassoon. Over the past two decades, she has presented world premiere performances throughout North America and Europe while maintaining equal footing in the creative music community as an improviser.

As a sought-after collaborative musician, Jessen has worked closely with dozens of artists including composers George Lewis, Pamela Z, and Michael Gordon, choreographer Pam Tanowitz, and music technologist Ted Moore, to name a few. Her solo work is almost entirely grounded in electroacoustic composition that highlight her unique musical language. Jessen has released three solo albums — Set (2023), Winter Chapel (2020), and Carve (2017) — and can also be heard on George Lewis’ Recombinant Trilogy (2021). As an advocate for electroacoustic music, Jessen is the Vice President of Splice, an organization dedicated to the performance, creation, and development of music for performers and electronics.

Jessen is the co-founder of the contemporary reed quintet, Splinter Reeds, an ensemble explicitly dedicated to cutting-edge composition by emerging and established composers. The ensemble regularly tours throughout the year, often serving as the ensemble-in-residence at numerous academic institutions while presenting concerts on new music festivals and concert series. Jessen has performed as a chamber musician with groups such as Alarm Will Sound, Amsterdam’s DOEK Collective, the San Francisco Contemporary Music Players, the Tri-Centric Ensemble, Ensemble Dal Niente, and Roomful of Teeth, among many others. She is also active in the creative music world, having performed with improvisers such as Mary Halvorson, Taylor Ho Bynum, Sam Pluta, Anne La Berge, Jaribu Shahid, Wilbert de Joode, Frank Gratkowski, Mike Reed, Joe Morris, Erica Dicker, and many others.

Recent concert highlights include performances at NYC’s TIME:SPANS Festival and ISSUE Project Room, Roulette in Brooklyn, Harvard University’s Paine Hall, Dublin’s Music Current Festival, the Bang on a Can Marathon and LOUD Weekend festival, Amsterdam’s DOEK Festival, Mengi in Reykjavik, San Francisco’s Exploratorium, and the Cleveland Uncommon Sound Project. Her recordings can be heard on New Focus, Innova, Cantaloupe Music, New World, Ravello, RIOJA, Evil Rabbit, and the Oberlin Music record labels.

A dedicated educator and pedagogue, Jessen is Associate Professor of Contemporary Music & Improvisation at the Oberlin Conservatory. She has taught for several summers at the Splice Institute and Walden School for Young Musicians and recently at New Music on the Point. She regularly presents masterclasses and workshops on topics surrounding contemporary music and improvisation at academic institutions throughout the year. In addition to her own conservatory training, Jessen lived in Amsterdam for three years as the recipient of the J. William Fulbright Fellowship and HSP Huygens Fellowship.