Mohammad Reza Mortazavi was born in 1979 in Isfahan, Iran, two months after the revolution. For more than twenty years he has lived and worked in Germany, as a musician and composer. The sound of the tombak and the daf has always fascinated him, linking this interest to a multifaceted and constantly evolving conception of music and movement. His musical ideas exceed traditional techniques as well as his ways of playing both instruments. Finding a balance between concentration and abandonment, he seeks to tune into the constantly changing motion where the limits of the body and mind dissolve. By directing attention to sound, Mortazavi chooses to detach himself from the instrument and national-cultural narratives, searching for an idea of music connected to a deep, internal feeling.
His album FOCUS was released in 2018 on the Padre Himalaya label, and since 2019 he has been invited to perform by important musical institutions such as Sydney Opera House, Rewire, Minimal Music Festival and Atonal in Berlin. In October 2019, the Parisian label Latency released the album RITME JAAVDANEGI, elected by Pitchfork as one of the best experimental albums of that year. In 2020 he composed a version of the Credo based on Ludwig van Beethoven’s Messa Solemnis, op.123. In 2022 his new album PRISMA was released via flow.fish.
Mohammad Reza Mortazavi has performed in concert halls such as Philharmonie Berlin, Pierre Boulez Saal, Philharmonie Luxembourg, Philharmonie Köln, Hong Kong Cultural Centre Concert Hall and Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen.
presented at Short Theatre 2024 within Eco:frequenze funded by Next Generation EU
ph. Kanaan Brothers