Manning, Jane (Marian)

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Manning, Jane (Marian)

Manning, Jane (Marian), English soprano; b.Norwich, Sept. 20,1938. She was a student of Greene at the Royal Academy of Music in London (1956–60), of Husler at the Scuola di Canto in Cureglia, Switzerland, and of Frederick Jackson and Yvonne Rodd-Marling in London. In 1964 she made her debut in London singing songs of Webern, Messiaen, and Dallapiccola, and subsequently established herself as a leading proponent of modern music. From 1965 she sang regularly on the BBC, and also toured extensively around the globe. In all, she sang in more than 300 premieres of contemporary scores. In 1988 she founded her own Jane’s Minstrels in London, an ensemble devoted to the furtherance of contemporary music. She was active as a lecturer, serving as a visiting prof. at Mills Coll. in Oakland, Calif. (1982–86), as a lecturer at the Univ. of York (1987), as a visiting prof. at the Royal Academy of Music (from 1995), and as an honorary prof. at the Univ. of Keele (1996–99). She publ, the book New Vocal Repertory: An Introduction (2 vols., Oxford, 1994, 1997). In 1990 she was made a member of the Order of the British Empire. In 1966 she married Anthony Payne.

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire