jasna Gara

is a Serbian vocalist and composer, born in 1990 in Subotica, Serbia. Being raised in a classical music environment, her first contact with music began at the age of 8 when she started her piano and music theory studies. At that time she was also a soloist for the children’s city choir, that held the title “Champion of the Republic” for five years and performed in various festivals in Loreto (Italy), Civitanova (Italy), Olomouc (Czech Republic), Varna(Bulgaria), Ohrid(FYROM) and many others. At the age of 13 she had her first solo performance at the Mini-Tini festival with the song titled “Sama”/“Alone” written by the famous Serbian composer Jovan Adamov, and soon began actively performing and touring in Europe.

At the age of 16 she started her vocal pedagogy studies in the class of Ana Sajrer. As a member of one of the oldest Folklore Ensembles for Dance and Music in the region, Gusle, Jasna started collecting and notating music from field studies, organised Ethnomusicology camps and assisted in traditional vocal coaching. Under the conducting baton of the famous conductor Darinka Matic Marovic she extended her knowledge and got accepted to LCCM(London Center of Contemporary Music, UK) to major in Performance and Music Production, and was also offered a scholarship to Berklee College of Music (Boston) - a result of a very competitive audition process. 

After moving to Boston in 2010, in parallel to her music studies, Jasna created learning and performance opportunities outside the classroom. She was motivated to musically unite Eastern and Western cultures, who are politically at odds, and started directing performances with students from all around the world at the Berklee International Folk Festival. These performances were ultimately broadcasted on Serbian National Television. As a student assistant, she helped create the Berklee Balkan Choir, which is still an active ensemble at Berklee. With her passion to raise awareness about climate change and education, Jasna volunteered her talents to enact positive change in the world. She was deeply involved in many musical relief projects that benefited the survivors of earthquakes in Japan and Turkey, worked with AmeriCares to give disaster relief to people in crisis in USA and around the world, raised awareness for the Amazon rainforest with the Amazon Aid Foundation and supported quality education for girls with the organisation Because I am a GIRL. She also built an impressive performance resume, singing multiple times at prestigious venues such as the Isabella Steward Gardner Museum, Massachusetts State House, Paramount Theatre, Boston Symphony Hall, Berklee Performance Center, Agganis Arena, Hatch Memorial Shell, Brighton Music Hall, Outside the Box Festival, TEDx Conference, Walt Disney Concert Hall ; at Harvard University she was invited to perform for honorary guests President Bill Clinton and his daughter Chelsea Clinton in celebrating 100 years of Harvard School of Public Health. As a studio and live performer, Jasna's collaborations include Grammy Award winning artists Bill Whelan, Valerie Simpson, Terry Lynn Carrington and Gerry Allen.

Since moving to Los Angeles in 2016, Jasna graduated from California Institute of the Arts, earning a Master's Degree in Fine Arts, majoring in Composition and Performance. Upon graduation, she was the CalArts teaching artist fellow, providing voice lesson to students at Watts Towers Arts Center, in Watts, CA, and was also the music and creative director of CalArts Expo. Jasna currenlty serves as Los Angeles Opera’s Production Manager.

In her free time, she loves exploring Los Angeles outdoors with her baby Theo and Border Collie Looper.