The limitless creativity of Vanessa Tomlinson has spawned significant contributions in the fields of solo percussion, contemporary chamber music, improvisation and performance art.
As a soloist she has worked closely with influential European composers Vinko Globokar and Brian Ferneyhough and commissioned numerous works from emerging Australian and American composers. She performs frequently with a wide array of contemporary chamber and improvisation ensembles, including Australian Art Orchestra, Elision, Intergalactic Contemporary Ensemble and Clocked Out Duo, was an original member of the “red fish blue fish” percussion ensemble, and has more recently founded the Australian percussion quartet Playing Fields. As co-founder of Melbourne-based Clocked Out Productions she directed award-winning musico-theatrical productions, organized and curated influential concert series and events.
Increasingly her work involves hybrid forms, combining improvisation and composition, percussion and voice, cross-disciplinary collaborations with dancers and visual artists and cross-cultural collaborations.

“Vanessa Tomlinson has the technique, the sensitivity, the voice and the sense of dramatic timing that enable her to create, with total conviction, a world where percussion, speech and movement mix and match in a distinctive and original art form.” (Elizabeth Silsbury, The Advertiser - Australia 1996)