Resonate Magazine | Australian Music Centre

Image: Emily Sheppard  
© Bruce Moyle

With the release of the album Age-old, we talk to Emily Sheppard, one of the recipients of the ABC Classic Composer Commissioning Fund in 2021, about the collaborative project with singer-songwriter and lyricist Claire Anne Taylor. The project is a deep, musical reflection on the lived experiences of aging and invisibility through women's perspectives.

Congratulations on the release of your new album Age-old! Can you tell us about this project and how it came about?

This project has been a pipe-dream of mine for almost a decade now. As a classical music student at ANAM (Australian National Academy of Music) I got to play in Conversations with Ghosts, a crossover project featuring chamber orchestrations of music written and performed by Paul Kelly and James Ledger. I loved these new sound worlds and have been chasing these sorts of cross-genre sounds ever since.

For Age-old, I put together my dream team of musicians across different musical backgrounds - we had Michael Kieran Harvey on piano, Aurora Henrich on double bass, Danny Healy on clarinet and bass clarinet, and the wonderful Claire Anne Taylor on vocals and lyric writing. Claire is a folk singer songwriter, who has an exceptional aural sense for music. We had months of rich collaboration as we worked up the vocal pieces in the suite.

Age-old explores this concept of the intersectionality of invisibility through age and gender. What initially drew you to this idea?

Growing up, both Claire and I heard stories from our mothers about invisibility and ageism, especially in the workplace. I've also always had friends of varying ages, and really valued these connections. You hang around with people in a different generation to you long enough and you start to see and hear about some of the invisibility and ageism that they face. We felt this was a theme that needed to be brought more into ongoing discussions, given its negative impacts on all people, regardless of their age.

For this project you interviewed some people to draw from their perspectives through life. Were there any insights that surprised or resonated with your own experiences?

Yes, plenty! What was perhaps most interesting is that the experience of our four interviewees was so diverse. We found that there were many different factors that interacted with people's experience of invisibility and ageism. Claire's mum, Anne Willis, spoke to one of the driving factors being societal values of 'youth' and its conflation that with 'beauty' that contribute to invisibility as you age. She said:

"…women have been brought up by our society…to use their attractiveness or their beauty for success. As you age you don't attract attention in the same way because you're older and you're not as beautiful and you lack youth, which is such a highly prized thing in our society. People can just overlook you in the conversation or in the street and make up their minds about you without having an enthusiasm to know any more about you."

However, Anne found that her invisibility wasn't always a negative thing:

"In one way it can be a freedom almost because you're sort of under the radar. You can be more eccentric or act without being under the watchful eye of the world. It's a funny thing. There's no pressure on you anymore. You get a bit of a laugh out of it."

Non-binary opera singer Quin Thomson feels there are barriers to professional singing work that have increased with age.

"I'm at the top of my form as a musician. But I'm heavy and I have grey hair. Those things are a deal breaker, it doesn't matter how well I sing. If I were a man I don't think that'd be the same."

Since moving to Tasmania, they found their opportunities increased, although this also required a broadening of their professional skillset.

"There are many more opportunities in Tasmania to do your own thing and innovate. But you have to be quite multi-faceted - it's not enough to be a performer."

Another interviewee, Jane Gadd, didn't feel as much invisibility based on her gender:

"I came from a big family - boys and girls - everyone was expected of the same - to go as far as they could in study."

And while she did notice invisibility increasing as she got older, she found that once she started talking to people, she would be able to take back her visibility that she had had in younger days.

"As I've got older…I've felt less important in some situations than I have for the rest of my life. But then I start talking to people and tend to take over, take back my feeling."

There was also some wonderful advice from our interviewees that I would love to share here, with a central theme of authenticity.

"The mistake we make as professionals is pursuing a professional goal to the detriment of authenticity around self. The more fully I embrace a multifaceted practice, the more I feel in line with who I am as a person." Quin Thomson

"Have as much fun as you possibly can, because there will be the downtimes. Dance and sing and shout and do everything that you can when you're young….mind you I still do that." Jane Gadd

"You need to take time for yourself. You need to nurture yourself. You need to sometimes back off and slow down. You don't have to be strong all the time. You're allowed to give yourself permission to acknowledge that you feel weak. Leap in and follow your passions. Be more sure. Believe in yourself." Anne Willis

How did you synthesise their perspectives and interpret them through sound?

The interviews inspired both the musical and lyrical content of the suite. Hell for Leather reflects the perspective of an artist about to leave the 'youth' category, who has been told they need to make it now before they become invisible.

"Time means nothing
to the universe
but to my
dying dream
It means everything
It's now or never
now or never
hell for leather"

Musically this sentiment is captured through the urgent tempo, relentless semiquaver movement and a crazed bridge section featuring fortissimo slap bass, bass piano and improvised clarinet and violin.

I created a hazy sound world for 'Into mist, almost', to represent an artist on the edge of invisibility. I wanted to create a mirage-like texture where all three instruments blend into one indistinct sound, morphing in and out with hairpin dynamics.

'Reverence' reflects a strong woman who is full of pride, acceptance and strength.

"Oh and all of the lines
you see on my face
each one tells a story
the cracks in my skin
weathered with age
Bones they creak
and hands they shake
from all of the life
from all of life

reverence
for this skin I'm living in
where nothing, nothing weighs me down
In this sweet reverence
for all I've ever been
Nothing weighs me down
I'm floating now"

Musically, this piece embraces imperfection and strength, featuring spacious rich piano chords, using a hidden swing rhythm throughout, and climaxing with an improvised clarinet solo.

'Old Friend' is a reflection at the end of one's life, pondering what is it to live a good life. Musically this piece is settled, simple and spacious, characterised by intimate vocals, soft piano melodies and enveloped in a violin drone throughout the piece.

"Oh when you look back, over the time we had
oh when you look back on your life
Will you be satisfied?
I think you might"

The result is quite a tender and cohesive work that straddles between classical and folk. Can you tell us a bit more about your musical background and your approach to composing music?

I trained as a classical violinist for around 15 years, doing my time with scales, etudes and concertos. I have also always had an urge to creative my own music, and this was nurtured by some key mentors in my life. At high school, this was my composition teacher Anthony Lyons, and a composer's workshops with Speak Percussion, through which I was introduced to the very rich and diverse world of contemporary classical music. After finishing up at ANAM, I moved to Tasmania. The grassroots and vibrant music industry here had a large impact on my practice. I was able to start immersing myself in many different genres. Through jam sessions, busking, collaborations, and session recording work I got to play with Celtic, Scandinavian, Manouche Jazz, Japanese Zen and Classical Indian musicians. Some important collaborators that have inspired me and influenced my approach to composition are shakuhachi player Anne Norman and multi-instrumentalist Yyan Ng. I have also spent much time in wilderness areas of Tasmania - deep underground in caves, diving underwater and bushwalking - which often inspires the feelings of my work.

I compose mostly by ear/aurally at first, recording sounds, melodies and ideas into an audio program, and layering different instruments and voices to create a demo recording of the composition. I only notate these once I'm happy with how the recording sounds. I find working in this way keeps the work living in a state of flux for longer.

Do you have any projects in the works that we should listen out for?

I'm playing as part of an inaugural festival on King Island run by the Bowerbird Collective, the Moonbird Festival, featuring some music arranged from my chamber-folk project Where Water Meets to be performed with string quartet at the festival. Also keep an eye out for a new album from the Van Diemen's Fiddles, scheduled for later this year.