Sofia Jernberg - NOSPR

Sofia Jernberg, born in Ethiopia and brought up in Ethiopia, Vietnam and Sweden, is a singer and composer. Central to her work are unconventional techniques and sounds with focus on the human acoustic voice. Touching themes like identity, internationality, origin, belonging as well as a strong belief in communion and collaboration.

Music theatre and contemporary opera play an important role in Jernberg’s artistic work. She participated in performances of Arnold Schönberg’s Pierrot lunaire in 2010 and Salvatore Sciarrino’s Lohengrin in 2014 by the Swedish ensemble Norrbotten NEO and embodied roles specifically written for her in new works such as Folie à Deux by Emily Hall and UR_ by Anna Thorvaldsdottir. The production of Pierrot lunaire, directed by Marlene Monteiro Freitas and conducted by Ingo Metzmacher, featured her as soloist together with Klangforum Wien at the Wiener Festwochen 2021 as well as at the KunstFestSpiele Herrenhausen and the Festival d’Automne à Paris 2022.

She has received several commissions as a composer and recently premiered her new work Dreams of our future for children’s choir, soprano, voice and chamber ensemble at the Ultima Festival Oslo 2022 and a new work for the Ensemble Contrechamps at the Borealis Festival 2023 in Bergen.

In the season 2025/26, Sofia Jernberg will present the premieres of Czernowin’s No! with the Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra in Katowice, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France at the Philharmonie de Paris and with the RSO Wien at the Wiener Musikverein. She will interpret the world premiere of a new composition by Alex Paxton together with the WDR Sinfonieorchester at the Kölner Philharmonie and perform with pianist Alexander Hawkins at the Konzerthaus Dortmund. Further engagements will also take her to the Festspiele Herrenhausen, the Wiener Festwochen and to the Ensemble Recherche in Freiburg.