Sarah Jessop

Position
Assistant Professor of Theater
Affiliated Departments

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Sarah Jessop, a singer, voice and movement teacher, and performance-maker, joined the Conservatory in 2021 as an assistant professor of theater and teaches Vocal Physical Connection in the Contemporary Theater Department. In 2020 Jessop was an artist in residence in the Department of Theatre at Concordia University (Montreal), where she created the devised theater course, Female Retellings of Greek Myth, and directed a live Zoom adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s The Penelopiad.

As a vocal coach, Jessop has worked with award-winning directors John Tiffany (original cast of Tony Award-winning Broadway production of Once, 2011), Sarah Benson (Ajax, 2010), and Marcus Stern (Neighborhood 3, 2011). Jessop has taught at the Moscow Art Theatre, American Repertory Theatre Institute, and Brown and Concordia universities.

As a performer, Jessop first trained in traditional Irish music at the University of Limerick. She has opened for Lunasa at One Longfellow (Portland, Maine) and gave fully a cappella concerts at Blue (Portland, Maine), and Jalopy Theatre (Brooklyn, New York). She has also performed at the Detroit Institute of Art, St. Mary's Cathedral in Memphis, and Paradise Rock Club in Boston. Jessop has studied and taught vocal improvisation, and is an associate teacher of Fitzmaurice Voicework.

Jessop is also the former associate director for engagement and communication at Harvard University’s Bok Center for Teaching and Learning, where she designed speaking curricula that aimed to foster freer, more connected expression, and trained faculty to access their teaching passion through the physical voice. Her recent teaching work centers on the reclamation of embodiment, pleasure, and self-ownership as an access point to physiological reconnection to vocal courage and fierce community.

Sarah has an M.F.A. in Voice Pedagogy from the American Repertory Theater / Moscow Art Theater School, and a B.A. from Harvard.

Notable Recent Works

  • Poetry of Perception (Science and Animation series, featured in The Atlantic magazine, Vimeo Staff Picks, 2015)—Voiceover 
  • “Quiet and Peace” (Buffalo Tom, CD/LP, Schoolkids,Scrawny Records, 2018)—Vocalist
  • Sarah Jessop + Brittany Karlson (Private Venue, Jamaica Plain, MA, 2018)—Vocalist
  • "Brightness of Your Eyes" (Memorial Service, Harvard University, 2021)—Composer, Vocalist
Education
  • School Name
    American Rep Theatre / Moscow Art Theater at Harvard
    Degree
    Master of Fine Arts (M.F.A)
    Field of Study
    Vocal Pedagogy
    Date Degree Received
  • School Name
    Harvard University
    State or Province
    Massachusetts
    Degree
    Bachelor of Arts (B.A.)
    Field of Study
    English Literature
    Date Degree Received