bio
Joanna Ward (b. 1998) is a composer, performer, and researcher from Newcastle upon Tyne, currently based in London.
She was a Junior Fellow at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, learning with Amber Priestley, in 2021-22. She was also a Britten Pears Young Artist for 2021-22. Recent projects have included creating works for the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Zubin Kanga's Cyborg Soloists project, the Aldeburgh Festival 2022, EXAUDI for the Norfolk & Norwich Festival, and s co-creation project with Newcastle Youth Choir for the Newcastle Sings Festival 2022.
She recently graduated from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama with a Masters in Composition.
Joanna is interested in experimenting with scores and with sound, and her practice ranges across genre and between media, usually in collaboration with other performers, artists and thinkers. Her framework is political. Her research is interested in radical liberatory futures of new music, and specifically in the philosophy, politics, and ethics of 'work' with regard to cultural production and music creation specifically. Her writing has recently been published by I Care If You Listen and TEMPO New Music Journal.
As a vocalist and performer she is interested in contemporary and experimental repertoires as well as songwriting and improvisation. She performed with experimental duo the mermaid café who released an EP on Takuroku in September 2021.
You can download her full CV here.