Jennifer Sherrill

Jennifer Sherrill is a doctoral candidate in ethnomusicology at the University of California, Davis. She holds degrees in vocal performance and vocal pedagogy and worked professionally as a classical singer and voice teacher in the Chicagoland area for twenty years. She first traveled to Lesvos, Greece in 2017, where she taught in refugee communities and developed a student-centered approach influenced by trauma-informed pedagogy. She is a Bilinski Fellow and Fulbright finalist and has presented her research at the Society for Ethnomusicology, the International Council for Traditions of Music and Dance, the American Academy of Religion, and the American Musicological Society. 

She is published in the music therapy journal, Approaches, and the Journal, Gastroethnomusicology, and she has a forthcoming Routledge book chapter, titled, “Saint Valentine Sings: Sharing Auditory Space in the Catholic Church of Lesvos.” Her interdisciplinary research on music-making in contested spaces draws from the fields of musicology, religious studies, anthropology, migration studies, and music education. She has been an invited guest lecturer at Mary Immaculate College in Limerick, Ireland and the University of the Aegean in Lesvos, Greece. She is currently based in Lesvos, where she works in affiliation with the University of the Aegean and the ethnography lab in the department of social anthropology and history. She sits on the board of Siniparxi, a Greek grass-roots cultural club founded in the 1990s focused on facilitating closer communications between Greek and Turkish citizens. She is also an active member and soloist of the Animato Chamber Choir, part of the North Aegean Centre for Music Education and Practice. She teaches in Animato’s Children’s Choir and provides ukulele instruction for adult learners through the organization’s educational programs.