David Kotlowy

David Kotlowy is an Australian composer and was born in 1959. As well as writing for Western classical ensembles, he has been active as a composer and performer (electric and acoustic guitars, sitar, Javanese gamelan) in experimental, fusion and traditional non-western music ensembles for many years. He incorporates aesthetics and structures from Asian musics into compositions for Western classical ensembles, and he writes for ensembles comprising instruments from both Eastern and Western classical traditions.


Academic Studies :

1983: Bachelor of Music, Adelaide University after completing study in Composition with Richard Meale and Electronic Music with Tristram Cary.

1984: Bachelor of Music, First Class Honours (Music Education) - Adelaide University.


Teaching Experience :

since 1993: Guitar teacher and theory lecturer at the Centre for Aboriginal Studies in Music, Adelaide University.


Recent Activities :

Compositions performed in the 1992, 1996 and 1998 Adelaide Festivals by Lights new music ensemble.

Composer and performer in Excavation : The Last Days of Mankind, the Mene Mene/Centre of Performing Arts production of the 1996 Adelaide Festival.

The commission and live-to-air broadcast by New Music Australia of "Music for Zen Musicians", a composition involving simultaneous performances by musicians in Sydney (shakuhachi, guqin, clarinet), Adelaide (piano, prepared piano) and Perth (piano, bass accordion). (1995).

An Australia Council commissioned work for (Japanese) shakuhachi, (Chinese) guqin and pianoforte, "Sotto Voce" (1996).

A commissioned work for the Javanese Gamelan ensemble Nyi Sekar Laras.

A composer and performer in music theatre productions for the 1988 and 1990 Adelaide Fringe Festivals, the NSW Bicentennial Festival of Music, the 1994, 1995 and 1996 International Barossa Music Festivals.

Compositions in numerous Adelaide new music concerts by Notework, Urizen, ACME New Music Co., Lights, and The Firm.

Co-director of the composer-collective The Firm.

Press :

"Kotlowy's work is intensely focused on the act of listening. The basic structure of his music is extremely simple, single distinct notes sounded separately between periods of silence. Kotlowy concentrates a microscopic focus on the character of each note in isolation, making audible its distant delicate harmonic resonances, but also drawing attention to the incidental variations in the act of playing. It resembles Chinese calligraphy, in that the artist's gestures leave large areas of the canvas untouched. Notes overlap to create delicate shifts of harmonic texture, but developmental flow is quietly resisted, creating a sense of being in time rather than moving through it." RealTime, December 01 - January 02

"The listening process is entirely different for Kotlowy's music. He uses incredibly thin, slowly changing textures to produce an atmosphere of immense quietude, as in Ascending Afterglow for string quartet or his Zen-inspired Dharma-Gates Dharani for voices. I find his pieces depend very much on one's frame of mind at the time : if one is in a receptive mood, his music approaches something profoundly meditative in its silently moving stillness." The Adelaide Review, October, 2001


Selected Compositions :

"Monkey and The White-Bone Demon" (1988) - a youth opera based on the Chinese folk story 'Journey To The West'.

"Huangshan Postcards" (1990) - for flute, clarinet, violin, cello and piano.

"The Garden" (1990) - for koto and pianoforte. Premiered in a live broadcast on national radio.

"Music for Zen Musicians" (1995) a composition involving simultaneous performances by musicians in Sydney (shakuhachi, guqin, clarinet), Adelaide (piano, prepared piano) and Perth (piano, bass accordion).

"Sotto Voce" (1996) - for (Japanese) shakuhachi, (Chinese) guqin and pianoforte.

"Diamond Traces" (1997) - for clarinet quintet.

"Pedut Ing Argo Candi" (1999) - for Javanese Gamelan ensemble.

" For string quartet" (1999) - for string quartet.

"For Four" (1999) - for the ensemble 'Tritone 2'; mezzo soprano, flute, piano, cello.

"In the Cloudiness Of Our Questioning" (1999) - for clarinet, horn, bassoon, piano, violin, viola, cello.

"Autumn Songs" (2000) - for soprano and string quartet.

"Inner Voices" (2000) for 13 strings.

"Ascending afterglow" (2001) for string quartet.