Borealis x BIT20
Diana Soh is a Singaporean composer who is deeply interested not only in writing music but in responding to the world around her. She creates a private space where she can freely explore ideas and uses it to craft sonic—and sometimes visual—experiences for her audiences, offering them a chance to depart from their immediate surroundings, draw from their own experiences, and take flight into new worlds.
Soh’s work is, in a sense, a personal journal shared with the public. She loves observing people and telling stories that are enigmatic, coded, and open to interpretation. She believes that listening to new music is inherently challenging, requiring a suspension of judgment to receive a coded message. Her compositions do not deliberately seek to shock or be political; they arise from sounds she loves and finds compelling. Life itself, in all its complexity—including violence—is her material.
For Soh, all music is experiential, teaching us how to feel and how to love. Her aim is to create truthful, well-constructed experiences that resonate with the world around her. Since 2011, she has lived in Paris, where she continues to put dots on paper, enjoy great food, and draw inspiration from the city’s vibrant cultural life.