One of today’s most exciting artists, Singaporean composer Diana Soh is based in Paris and works across a wide range of disciplines—from chamber and orchestral music to dance, film, choral works, and multimedia site-specific creations. Her music explores performance interactivity, theatricality, and vivid sound colour, often developed through close collaborations with performers. Known for her interest in theatre and integrating the use of technology, she often surprises her audiences and finds unique ways to address the social issues of our time in her work and “composes the impossible” (Concert Classic).
Recent highlights include The Carmen Case, a music theatre work co-commissioned by La Monnaie, La Chapelle Musicale, Gulbenkian Foundation, Théâtre du Luxembourg, and ensemble Ars Nova, staged by Alexandra Lacroix. Premiered in 2023 at Le TAP in Poitiers, it will tour to Opéra de Bordeaux and Théâtre du Luxembourg in 2024. Upcoming projects include L’avenir nous le dira, an opera for the children’s choir of Opéra de Lyon and robotised orchestra, with staging by Alice Laloy and text by Emmanuelle Destremeau, to premiere during the 2025 Lyon Festival. That same season will see a new work Songs from whence I came for electronics, mezzo Rinat Shaham, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France (Festival Manifeste IRCAM) and an hour long program Sous notre peau for Quatour Présages.
Vocal writing continues to be central to Diana’s work. Following Tu es Magique (Maîtrise de Radio France, Festival Présences 2022) and Ackee (Sequenza 93, Paris 2024 Olympics), she has also written La Ville-Zizi for soprano Laura Bowler, Unbroken for mezzo Rosie Middleton, and I linger lately beyond my time for soprano Claron MacFadden and Ensemble Intercontemporain (Aix-en- Provence Festival 2024). Diana will also perform with the SYC Ensemble Singers for their 60th anniversary in a new work The body electric.
2024 was a prolific year for instrumental works, with premieres including on, off and on again for solo organ (Philharmonie de Paris), And those who were seen dancing for the Arditti Quartet, and I forget to remember when I am with you, a large-scale work integrating five pieces across six organisations in the French Alps, with performances from July to October.
Earlier milestones include A is for Aiyah (Singapore Symphony Orchestra, 2018), sssh (Mettis Quartet, Aix 2018), and Zylan ne chantera plus, a monodrama with Yann Verburgh staged by Richard Brunel (Opéra de Lyon “hors les murs”, 2021). Diana was composer-in-residence at La Muse en Circuit (2012–13), Divertimento Ensemble (2019), and Opéra de Bordeaux (2023–24). Her monographic CD Still, Yet, And Again (Stradivarius) was released in 2019.
Her works have been broadcast on BBC Radio 3, France Musique, RAI, WDR, and ORF, and performed by Ensemble Intercontemporain, Klangforum Wien, Arditti Quartet, Ensemble CourtCircuit, Schallfeld Ensemble, and more. She collaborates with artists including Elise Chauvin, Emmanuelle Ophèle, Jean Rondeau, James McVinnie, and conductors Jean Deroyer, Pierre-André Valade, Fabien Gabel, Lucie Leguay and Sofi Jeannin.
Diana studied in Singapore, the USA, and France, and has worked with Ferneyhough, Sciarrino, Eötvös, Rihm, and Furrer. She received Singapore’s Young Artist Award (2015), the Impuls Composition Prize (2017), and SACEM’s Francis and Mica Salabert Prize (2021). She was composer in residence at Opera de Bordeaux during the 2023/2024 season and will be visiting professor and composer in residence at the University of Toronto for autumn 2025.
- updated January 2025