The American mezzo-soprano Jesse Mashburn comes from Hartselle, Alabama. At the age of thirteen, she was encouraged by her choir director at school to study classical music. She earned her Bachelor's degree from Oberlin Conservatory in 2018 and her Master of Music from the Maryland Opera Studio at the University of Maryland in 2020.
Since 2022, she has been studying in the post-graduate program opera class of Kai Röhrig, Florentine Klepper, and Ildiko Raimondi at the Mozarteum University, where she recently performed as Mistress Quickly (Falstaff) and the Composer (Ariadne auf Naxos).
Mashburn's other recent roles include the Witch (Hänsel und Gretel) and Mrs. Grose in (Turn of the Screw), Polinesso (Ariodante), Bradamante (Alcina), Baba (The Medium), Nicklausse (Les contes d'Hoffmann), Marcellina (Le Nozze di Figaro). The magazine 'Cleveland Classical' writes: "...the mellifluous Jesse Mashburn brought great comic character to the role of Marcellina".
In the summer of 2021, she took part in the Merola Opera Program in San Francisco as an up-and-coming artist. The San Francisco Chronicle described her performance in the Merola Grand Finale Concert as "extravagantly theatrical”.