composer
One of the most visible Romanian composers, Diana Rotaru (b. 1981, Bucharest) has written from chamber and orchestral music to chamber opera and soundtracks for multimedia or dance shows and short films. Her music explores different expressive directions, from hypnagogia or pre-oneiric aesthetics, feminine psyche, humor or imaginary folklore.
Diana Rotaru has won numerous prizes, among which the Romanian Academy’s George Enescu Award (2010), the ISCM-IAMIC Young Composer Award (World Music Days, Vilnius, 2008), the Irino Prize (Japan, 2004) or the George Enescu Prize ex-aequo (Romania, 2003 and 2005). Her works have been commissioned by Ensemble XXI (Dijon), Stockholm Saxophone Quartet, Pärlor för svin, Ernst von Siemens Foundation, Takefu International Music Festival, the Union of Romanian Composers and Musicologists, etc.
She was a resident at the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris (autumn 2007), on a George Enescu grant from the Romanian Cultural Institute. In April 2011 she was an Artist-in-Residence at Villa Sträuli, Winterthur (Switzerland), at the invitation of Ensemble TaG, who performed her music in two concerts during that period (Verborgen in einer Muschel/ Hidden Inside a Shell – Theater am Gleis and Meet the Artist: Diana Rotaru -Villa Sträuli). In April-June 2015 she was Artist-in-Residence in Vienna, with a grant offered by the Austrian Federal Chancellery & KulturKontakt Vienna.
Diana Rotaru is currently teaching composition at the National University of Music in Bucharest, where she studied with Ştefan Niculescu and Dan Dediu (2000-2005) and where she has a PhD in Composition (with the dissertation The Recent Trance and the Principle of Repetition in New Music, 2012). She also studied composition with Frédéric Durieux at the Conservatoire National Superieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris (2005-2006). She participated at different summer composition courses such as Acanthes (Metz, 2008), Voix Nouvelles-Royaumont (2002 and 2006), or the International Bartok Seminary (Szombathely, 2003), thus working with Jonathan Harvey, Salvatore Sciarrino, Brian Ferneyhough or Michael Jarrell, among others.
cultural promoter
Diana Rotaru is currently (since 2019) the President of the ISCM Romanian Section and the Artistic Director of the MERIDIAN international new music festival (a festival that takes place each November in Bucharest & Cluj-Napoca, Timisoara and Iasi). Editions: “Sonic Gardens” (2019), “Planetarium” (2021), “Atlas” (2022 – Radio Romania Cultural Prize for exceptional music event), “Persona” (2023), “Sonimagicon” (2024-2026).
She coordinates the Romanian Music Information Center (CIMRO) – a center in the frame of the National University of Music in Bucharest that currently represents the main PR partner for contemporary music events in Romania. Through CIMRO she has also organized 3 editions of CIMRO DAYS – a small-scaled Romanian music festival.
She is the musical advisor of two projects implemented and organized by pianist Adriana Toacsen – PIANO EXPRESS and ENCORE.
She was the Artistic Director of the SonoMania new music ensemble between 2012-2021.