Tessa Bird is an Adelaide born singer-songwriter inspired by the swirling sounds of British Neo-Soul and Pop. Her diverse style features silky yet powerful vocals, rich orchestration and poignant emotion. Tessa takes inspiration from other strong female artists such as Meg Mac, Florence Welch and Adele.

Her latest release “I Guess She Breathes a Little Calmer” is Mowtown meets James Bond and is her most potent single yet. Catchy blues riffs and swirling organ supports Tessa’s rousing grief-stricken vocals which tell the heart-breaking tale of raging female jealousy when ex-lovers move on. This track captures Tessa as a natural soul singer, oozing with both charisma and emotion, inspired by icons such as Amy Winehouse and Etta James.

Having spent over 15 years in the TV and film industry as a professional actor (Pine Gap, Bad Blood, Raising The Bar), Tessa creates tension-filled, cinematic tracks that are amplified by her theatrical film clips.

Before establishing herself as a solo artist, Tessa was one half of the band ‘Sitara’ with her sister Erin. Their 2013 debut track “In The Water” was in the Top 50 of the Vanda & Young Songwriting Competition; in 2014 they played at the WOMADelaide Festival and later that year, they represented Australian music at the BBC’s official event for the Glasgow Commonwealth Games. In 2015 Sitara supported Macy Gray during her national tour, and in 2017, Tessa co-produced Sitara’s 35min Visual Album “Alchemy” - an ambitious film and music project.

In early 2020, she worked with Grammy award-winning international producer Simon Cohen of Sydney’s Studios 301 (Justin Bieber, Lizzo, Vera Blue, Meg Mac). Her debut single “The Heavens Did Protest”, released in 2021, is a poetic, lyric-driven pop-ballad, written in full one rainy night. 

Her follow up single “If You Want Me” was released in 2022. The sultry pop song shows a softer side to the evocative soul-singer.

Her third release, “Clockwork”, is a pared back piano track featuring cello by Chris Piddock of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra. “Clockwork” spotlights Tessa’s exceptional vocal strength even in vulnerability and has a visually striking film clip, shot at Adelaide’s heritage Capri Theatre.