Biography/CV

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Martijn Comes (1979) is a Dutch composer who has a special interest in sound character in various musical traditions, with a special gravity towards electroacoustic composition.

He graduated at the academy for Digital Communications in 2004 with a thesis on live stage performance with the aid of digital media and studied Composition for Film with Jurre Haanstra at the Conservatory of Amsterdam (2010).  Next to performing locally he performed and held workshops in Europe and beyond: Athens, Madrid, Valencia, London, Paris, USA and Canada, and has been the mastering engineer for independent labels and artists including Bedouin Records.

His work for Carillon ‘EANN’ was premiered on the St Bavo Church in Haarlem, and was selected as the opening piece of the prestigious LE GUESS WHO festival, Utrecht in 2017. After this he was commissioned by the Gaudeamus Festival to write ‘MOTHER’, a piece for the Dom church Carillon in Utrecht. ‘Radiance, Time’ for carillon, tape and electronics was premiered 30/11/2019 as a commission from the Rewire festival.

His work has been broadcasted worldwide on local as well as national stations like VPRO Radio 4, Radio 3 Spain, Polish and Norwegian National Radio, and RTÉ Ireland. He worked with filmmaker Thomas Mohr his ‘Resonance’ & ‘Learning curve’ films, which both were curated by the LIMA Media Art Platform (former NiMK). ‘Resonance’ was part of the Best Of selection of the Ars Electronica festival in 2010.

He received worldwide commissions by: IO SOUND (ca), Bedouin Records (uae), Bastikaya Tapes (uae), Enmossed recs (usa) Silent Records (usa), Time Symmetric (us), WORM Rotterdam, Moving Furniture Records (nl), Smikkelbaard (nl), Municipality of Haarlem (nl), Oedipus Brewery Amsterdam (nl), Gaudemus Festival (nl), Rewire (nl) and Institute for Sound and Vision (nl).

He has written critiques for broadcasting network the VPRO (Vrije Geluiden) and he was an avid curator of concerts and host of two national radio shows in the Netherlands, ‘Kraak Helder’ and ‘Inventions for Radio’, both featured on the Concertzender. Both programs focussed on promoting innovative electro-acoustics and broadcast-art. Collaborations include the New BBC Radiophonic workshop.

Recent collaborations include Giulio Aldinucci, Saverio Rosi, Frans de Waard, Lukas Simonis, Hessel Veldman and he has collaborated in the past with artists such as Thomas Mohr, Martin Reints, Orphax, Mitchell Akiyama and Twine.