Just me and my violin and mandolin in Brooklyn. Also a computer :)

Look for my latest collection of songs, Haunted EP, at http://jessieshaffer.bandcamp.com/album/haunted-ep !!!
(12/12/12)

Check out my first official solo album, Puling at My Skirts, at JessieShaffer.Bandcamp.com!!! (11/11/11)

“Engages with discourses of memory and nostalgia...a relationship to history, and to artistic tradition, is a central factor in the way the music means. Shaffer chooses to employ a well established, ‘folk’ creative lexicon. She combines its signifiers according to a grammar of her own making, however, one of a decidedly modern, culturally self-aware cast. This applies equally to her musical materials, her performances and her lyrical content. She plays mandolin, some violin...and she sings; stylistically, it is clearly located in a folksong tradition, but it’s a curiously mid-Atlantic one. There are obvious elements of Americana, but a lot more than a nod to European sounds, and there is a gleeful affinity for the expressive potential of dissonance (as in the keening ‘Keen’). Her words are mysterious, delicately balanced possibilities of meaning, often clearly yearning in character, but also disturbing (‘I lost my limbs/ while you were sleeping’), and not without humour (‘Keeping my bloomers on for now’). ‘Pinwheel’ applies cut and paste techniques to Shaffer’s materials, in a brief outbreak of experimental folktronica. For me though, the creative highlight is ‘Gnarled’, where a simple, austere, unaccompanied vocal arrangement is shot through with astringent harmonies that remind me of the arresting opening to Rose Kemp’s Golden Shroud (although it’s a lot less mental, unsurprisingly). This is a lovely, thought-provoking set of recordings.”
-Oliver Arditi (www.oliverartditi.com)

"Ms Shaffer is based in Brooklyn/USA and records with mandolins and violins along with nice harmonies. It is the perfect music for rainy days in autumn! If you're listening to her music, you will not think that she is from the USA. The sound is in the tradition of Scandinavian singers and songwriters! Lean back and enjoy!"
-KALTBLUT Magazine (http://www.kaltblut-magazine.com/)

"Om jag hade fört någon slags geografisk statistik över hamnarna vi besökt är jag ganska säker på att Brooklyn skulle hamna i topp. Den här gången åker vi med på en vegetationstät och akustisk resa, där vindarna från mandolinen och violinen styr farten."
-Skogsgospel (http://skogsgospel.blogspot.com/)

As SoundClouder of the Day, 10/7/11 !!! :
http://www.facebook.com/soundcloud/posts/202913026447241
https://twitter.com/soundcloud/status/122402383560056835
http://soundcloud.tumblr.com/post/11149579423/scotd-jessie-shaffer