Otto Sidharta


Otto Sidharta is an Indonesian Composer. He is known for his electronic music.
Otto Sidharta finished his post-graduate study in composition and electronic music composition at Sweelinck Conservatorium in Amsterdam under the guidance of Professor Ton de Leeuw, and later on he gained his doctoral degree at Institute Seni Indonesia Surakarta.
Sidharta's interest in using environmental sounds to express his musical ideas developed when he was a student at the Jakarta Institute of Arts. He performed his first electronic music piece, Kemelut, based on water sounds in the First Indonesian Young Composer Festival in 1979. In 1979 he collected some nature and animal sounds on Nias, in the Borneo jungle, Riau islands, and some other remote places such as Banten, Kajang and Papua. These sounds were used as material for some of his works such as Ngendau, Hutan Plastik and East wind, Nature, Saluang, Kajang. And some others.
Beside being a composer, Sidharta used to be a chairman of both the Music Committee of Jakarta Art Council and Indonesian Composers Association. He teaches at Jakarta Institute of Arts, Sekolah Pascasarjana IKJ and in Cantus. Furthermore, he used to be the Music Director for the Nusantara Symphony Orchestra for several years.
For Supplement/Upstream, Sidharta created Wind of trade, a soundscape based on the sounds and voices associated with old Dutch and Indonesian culture, such as sounds from nature, markets, street vendors, trains, ships and children playing.

Works

  • Kemelut – live electronic music
  • Meta Ekologi – mix live and pre-recorded electronic music
  • Ngendau – soundscape
  • Hutan Plastik – soundscape
  • East Wind – mix soundscape & live performer
  • Untitled – a piece for clarinet, cello, percussion and tape
  • Gong – electronic music
  • Gaung – electronic music
  • Stringquartet – string quartet
  • Saluang – electronic music
  • Quintet for oboe, clarinet, violin, viola and cello
  • Trio for clarinet, cello and piano
  • Waves – computer-controlled electronic music
  • Marimba – for marimba solo
  • Pulses – computer music 1
  • Technophobia – live computer music with voice and dance
  • 3 in 1 – music for percussion, clarinet and computer
  • Rim's – computer music
  • RamayanaKu – for voice and computer
  • Matra – for percussion and computer
  • Topeng Monyet – computer music
  • Mitsuno Hibiki – for violin and computer
  • Goro-goro – for eight percussion players
  • Soundscape I – soundscape
  • Music for Clarinet and Computer
  • Music for Flute and Computer
  • Music for Biwa and Computer
  • Music for Piano and Computer
and a few untitled short works for non musical instruments and computer, gamelan instruments and computer.