Hugh Sheehan is a musician, composer, sound designer, and audio producer from Birmingham. Now based between London and Helsinki, Hugh produces work for concert hall, theatre, moving image, radio, and podcast. Much of his work explores questions of gender and sexuality, desire and shame, assimilation and radicalism.
In 2020 he was commissioned as a New Creative by BBC Arts and Arts Council England to make Lost Time - an audio short contemplating LGBTQ+ people’s experiences in getting to live life on their own terms. In 2022 he was comissioned by LGBTQ+ low-voice choirs The Sunday Boys (Manchester) and Melo'Men (Paris), via Institut Français’s contemporry music fund, to compose a new work for low voice choir and button accordion. His 2023 debut album Shapes That Are Different is a collection of songs and audio interviews about queer selfhood. Under the Radar says of the record “Sheehan offers a poetic ode to queer iconoclasm, examining the daring power inherent in queer existence.” In 2024 Hugh was comissioned by the BBC as part of its Audio Lab programme to make an audio documenatry series for BBC Sounds. The podcast will document lesser-known modern legal cases or pieces of legislation that have concerned the lives and rights of LGBTQ+ people in the UK. Hugh plays with and writes for several projects, including his own ensemble and duos with Maija Kauhanen and Timo Alakotila. He has worked internationally as a composer and sound designer for theatre, with directors including Roxy Cook, Josh Roche, and Gabriella Bird.
In addition to his creative practice, Hugh is co-founder, and former co-director and chairperson of The Trip to Birmingham TradFest, an Irish traditional music festival in Birmingham’s Digbeth, and the founder of Helsinki concert series/record label Hybrid Forms.
hughsheehan (at) me.com