Jeanne Conard Jones was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, and has lived in Europe, principally in Germany and England, since finishing her studies in music. Her Bachelor’s Degree is in Choral Conducting, and she holds a Master’s Degree in Vocal Pedagogy. After finishing at university she studied with the great American singing teacher Madeline Sanders, to whom she owes her understanding of vocal technique.
Jeanne has been teaching singing in the US and in Germany since 1980 and in the UK since 2010. She maintains a private voice studio, and also gives classes for beginning and intermediate singing students who prefer to learn in small groups. Her students include amateur and professional singers of all kinds, from the strictly classical to singers of musical theatre and she is particularly interested in vocal technique for choir singers.
She is a performer of wide range, singing in concerts, oratorio and song recitals in many European countries, including England, and in the United States. Over her career her repertoire has included German, French, Spanish, Italian, Czech, Russian, Polish, Swedish and English art song. She has performed in opera and operetta, oratorio and musical theatre, and enjoys performing American Spirituals and the songs of George Gershwin, Cole Porter and their contemporaries.
She made her conducting debut with the Fauré Requiem at age 22. While living in Germany she was for 18 years the principal conductor of the chorus of the European Space Operations Centre (ESOC), and for 10 years before moving to the UK she directed VolubiLys, an international, principally francophone, women’s chorus which concentrated mainly on modern Chansons. She also founded the Darmstadt Madrigal Singers, which performed many concerts of mainly English choral music and the Darmstadt Chamber Singers, with a more contemporary repertoire.
Jeanne has worked professionally as director of music and conductor of church choirs of various denominations, Catholic, Lutheran, Anglican/Episcopalian, Methodist and Presbyterian, in the US and in Germany.
She spent several years as music director of a small theatre in Darmstadt, Germany, directing and coaching amateur singers and actors in musical theatre, as well as teaching music theory, sight-singing and voice classes.
Since moving to England Jeanne has continued to perform lecture recitals, mainly of Artsong, and to pursue her activities in the vocal training of choir singers by giving talks on the subject to choirs, in workshops, and as part of individual choral rehearsals. From time to time she gives classes aimed toward clarifying techniques of use to choir singers of intermediate to advanced abilities.
She now is the conductor of the Moseley Chamber Singers, a small ensemble of highly skilled singers which performs a large and varied repertoire in concert.