“My work centres on listening as a creative and relational practice”.
About
Natalia Mann is a harpist and composer whose work centres on listening as a creative and relational practice. Through sound, she explores the subtle intelligence of place, environment, and interconnection, creating music that invites stillness, reflection, and deep presence.
Her practice, Resonance Music, emerges from long-term engagement with landscape, ecology, and the unseen relational fields that shape human and more-than-human experience. Performances are often site-responsive and are shaped by an attentiveness to atmosphere, memory, and the living world.
Alongside her musical work, Natalia also offers intuitive guidance sessions grounded in the same listening practice, translated through language rather than sound. Together, these strands reflect a commitment to listening as a form of care, translation, and relationship.
Natalia’s work sits at the intersection of music, environment, and contemplative practice, offering audiences experiences that are both grounding and expansive.
Biography
Current
Mann's music is deeply influenced by her connection to nature and visual art. She engages in projects that involve ‘playing’ the resonance of landscapes and environmental elements through synaesthesia. She brings together experimentation, classical music, improvisation and traditional music into a form she calls resonance music.
Resonance music is quantum way of translating frequencies into music. Akin to dadirri, resonance is an inner listening that connects people with the world around us. Natalia developed resonance music practice through a series of slow residencies. ‘The Art of Listening’ read art as score in galleries. Her seminal project ‘The Sonic Earth’ explores the musical resonance of forest and ocean. ‘The Blue Pen’ communicates with star frequencies, and ‘Conversations with the Earth’ inquires of landscape consciousness.
Her music, performance and art installations have been commissioned for the National Museum of Australia by Victor Steffensen, for Sanctuary: Fremantle Biennale, Ephemera Festival (Townsville), NorthSite Gallery(Gimuy), SA/MOA Ten Days on the Island, Bonemap Intermedia, Mandigalpay Yidinji, Minjil Arts, Emily Granger for HUSH, NZ Harp Society and NZHarpFest, Fâmes Croisées (Kanaky), Association Siapo (Kanaky).
Mann has given workshops, talks and published articles for the Melbourne Museum, Percy Grainger Museum, AsiaLink, NorthSite Gallery, National Indigenous Fire Workshop, Custodians of Country, Cairns Regional Council Green Space Our Place, Virtual Harp Summit I & II, NZ Harp Society, FNQ Harp Connection, Dumbo Feather Magazine, ABC Far North, Connect Magazine, Tū Mai Magazine, Spacifik Magazine and Tagata Pasifika.
Her works have been supported by Arts Queensland, Screenworks APRA/AMCOS, Regional Arts Development Fund, Cairns Regional Council, Tanks Arts Centre and NorthSite Gallery. She was awarded grants from Creative New Zealand and Creative New Zealand Pasifika Arts Board, Margaret Netze Legacy Fund and the Pasifika Arts Iosefa Enari Prize for Musical Excellence (2013).
Historic
Born in Wellington, New Zealand, Mann's musical journey began at the age of four when her family lived in Los Angeles. She initially focused on classical music, studying both harp and piano and by age 16, she was performing with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra and other NZ ensembles, performing with ballet, opera, theatre, and new music.
Mann's career is marked by a profound evolution from classical roots to a deep engagement with improvisation and experimental music. Her journey took a pivotal turn in her early twenties, leading her to explore diverse musical traditions and collaborate with artists from various genres.
Her relocation to Melbourne, Australia, immersed her in the vibrant international folk and roots music scene, where she further honed her improvisational skills and collaborated on projects spanning meditation music, pop, hip hop, lounge, underground and experimental styles, while studying classical music at Victorian College of the Arts. She was the inspiration behind Irine Vela’s Hip Hop Harp Concerto for Outer Urban Projects at the Melbourne International Festival of the Arts. She toured Nicky Bomba as Angelbomb duo, performed and recorded with Michael Johnson, David Jones, Elf Tranzporter, Oryelle Defenstrate, Mia Stone, Aurora Kurth, and many more. She was an original member of avant-garde improvisation trio Shima with Emma Bathgate & Naomi Jean, and the Turkish groups Gece and Unified Gecko with Murat Yucel.
Mann’s work celebrates her Pacific Island heritage and reflects her passion for cultural fusion and artistic exploration. She co-founded Brown Roots Creative Pacific Arts group in Melbourne, and the award-winning Samoan trio Suga (Sunga) with Grace Vanilau and Lila Meleisea, who toured internationally. She created together with Ela To’omaga and Marie Tamole, Tyssia Wahnawe and the group Kalaga’la based in Kanaky.
In 2005, Mann moved to Istanbul, Turkey, where she performed alongside Turkish classical master musicians such as İzzet Kızıl, Göksel Baktagir, Sumru Ağıryürüyen, Eda Karaytug and many more. This period saw her composing original pieces, culminating in the release of her album "Pasif.ist" in 2011 (Rattle NZ. In addition to her regular Pasif.ist concerts at Alt. Jazz club, accompanied by Sercan Halili on kemence and other wonderful guest musicians, Natalia appeared in European festivals, major concert houses and on Turkish Radio Television.
Additional endeavours included serving as the principal harpist with the Macedonian Philharmonic Orchestra, studying jazz in Skopje with Toni Kitanovski, composing for Black Grace contemporary dance company’s ‘The Nature of Things’, touring with New Zealand pop star Bic Runga, and the Irish-Maori Greenfire Islands.
Continually active in abstract music, she produced the album Utterance (RattleNZ 2013), with significant mentor Matua Richard Nunns and David Long. She featured on pioneering sound artist Ros Bandt’s Basilica Cistern sound symphony Medusa Dreaming (Neuma 2014) with Erdem Helvacioglu; performed with Dine Doneff (Thessaloniki/Berlin), experimental pioneers Korhan Erel (Turkey), Robert Reigle (USA), and arthouse Leda Atomica in Marseilles, France.
Mann gradually extended her musical expression into graphic scores, sculptural compositions, film, installation, and writing. Her conceptual framework, ‘Weaving of Perceptions’ is based on the concept that a Truth becomes more resonant for having not only one, but many perspectives. As she experiences so many ways of being and doing, they are woven into harmony through her music.