Serafina Steer

Serafina Steer is a UK-based English harpist, pianist, singer and songwriter. She studies classical harp at Chetham’s School of Music with Eira Lynn Jones, then continues at Trinity College of Music, London, where she studies with Imogen Barford and Gabriella Dall’Olio, gains a First Class Honours degree in Music, and receives the String Faculty Silver Medal. Songwriting becomes her main focus.

Recording work

Steer releases her first 7-inch single and the album Cheap Demo Bad Science on Static Caravan in 2007. The album includes a cover of Brian Eno’s “By This River” alongside her own material, and some of it is recorded and produced with Mike Lindsay of Tunng, while other tracks are recorded with Kristian Robinson, also known as Capitol K. In 2010 she issues Change Is Good Change Is Good on Static Caravan. After her harp is stolen, she completes parts of the album using recordings made before the theft and analogue synthesizers supplied by Benge. In 2011 she records the Bloody Hell EP with Paul Jones of Stolen Recordings; it includes two songs from Change Is Good Change Is Good and two new songs, and is presented as live harp and voice recordings. Her later releases include the EP Japan Tour EP in 2006, the album The Moths Are Real in 2012, and the EP Moth Club Boiler Woes in 2013.

Collaborations and performances

Steer appears live and on record with a wide range of musicians, including Patrick Wolf, Tunng, Capitol K, Cibelle, The Memory Band, Balearic Folk Orchestra, James Yorkston, Adem, Chrome Hoof, Leafcutter John, Simon Bookish, Seb Rochford and Shimmy Rivers and and Canal. She also works with Jarvis Cocker and Bat for Lashes. In 2010 and 2011 she joins John Foxx and The Maths for several single live concerts in London, playing analogue synthesizers and bass guitar.

Other projects

In 2015, Steer forms the band Bas Jan. She also performs with her brother Sam Steer, who makes the animation for the music video for her song “Tiger”. Branchage Film Festival in Jersey commissions her to compose a live soundtrack to a film of her choosing, and with support from PRS Women Make Music she and Sam create Postman’s Familiar, a psychedelic harp and stop-motion animation response to Kenneth Anger’s Rabbit’s Moon.