Susie Self studied voice, composition, guitar, lute and piano at the Royal College of Music: ARCM singing performance. She studied voice for 12 years with Josephine Veasey, composition with Stephen Dodgson and lute with Jacob Lindberg. After College she won scholarships from the Royal Society of Arts to study in Germany with Sena Jurinac and from the Banff Centre, Canada to study with John Cage. She comes from a highly artistic background, she is the granddaughter of poet and playwright John Drinkwater and her cousins are Nigel Kennedy and Will Self.

Known as Susannah Self in the opera world, her recent singing engagements include: Mrs Grose in “Turn of the Screw” conducted by Ivor Bolton, and Mistress Quickly in “Falstaff” in Salzburg, Mrs Grose in Santiago, Chile, Ulrica in “Un Ballo in Maschera” for Castleward Opera in Northern Ireland and 3rd Secretary in John Adam’s “Nixon in China” for the Greek National Opera, conducted by David Parry and Teresa in “La Sonnambula” for The Vlaamse Opera. In the last two years Susie has become a regular cover at Opera North and The Royal Opera House, Covent Garden. Roles include: Mrs Sedley in “Peter Grimes”, Magdalone in “Maskarade”, Aksinya in “Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk” and Brigitta in “Die Tote Stadt”. The summer of 2009 saw Susie covering Ježibaba in “Rusalka” at Glyndebourne. She made her debut with Lyon Opera in March 2010 starring as Ma Moss in Copland’s “The Tender Land”.

Susie sang as a “house mezzo” for 7 years with the Vlaamse Opera in Belgium and Opera du Rhin in Strasbourg. Her roles included: Madame de la Haltière in “Cendrillon”, Marie in “Der Fliegende Holländer” and Emilia in “Otello”. During this time she sang Mahler’s 3rd Symphony, Glass’s Peace Symphony and Verdi’s Requiem with the Flemish Philharmonic in Brussels and co-starred for a season with Jasper Carrot in “The Mikado” playing Katisha at the Savoy Theatre.

Susie was encouraged by Michael Finnissy to compose for The Royal Opera House’s “Garden Venture” and her opera HEROIC WOMEN was featured on Radio 3 and Woman’s Hour. It has toured to Taiwan, California, Mexico and London. Susie’s first two symphonies have been recorded by The Moravian Philharmonic. The Second was highly commended in the “Van de Vate” competition in Vienna and one movement of the first was performed in Beijingin 2008. Other commissions include: “Magnificat” for The Arts Council, “EIS” for Brigittenau Conservatoire Orchestra, Vienna and “Sheela–na-gig” for Sounds Positive. She recently finished her 3rd Symphony, “The Pacific”, based on the poem by Jack Kerouac, and is currently adapting material from it for her new one-woman opera “Wild”.

Susie co-directs Selfmade Music with her cellist/composer husband Michael Christie. She runs voice workshops for English Sinfonia, Dartington, Opera North, Skyros (Greece) and Esalen (California). She is a visiting professor of voice and composition at Junior Guildhall and has run her private holistic singing teaching practice in North London for 20 years.