biography
A New York City native, Matthew Ostrowski is a composer, performer, and
installation artist working primarily with electronics and sound. He studied
music at the Oberlin Conservatory in Ohio, and the Institute of Sonology in
The Hague. He has shared the stage with everyone from John Zorn and David
Behrman to a trio of Elvis impersonators.
He spent most of the 1980s in a series of low-ceilinged venues in New York
City, improvising with live electronics, amplified objects, and broken tape
recorders in the days when it was still a novelty. performing with such
downtown regulars as Anthony Coleman, Zeena Parkins, David Shea, and
countless others, while also working on a series of practically unrealizable
music-theater pieces, and playing with the critically-acclaimed avant-noise
band Krackhouse. He was also one of the originators of the
Surrealist-inspired Exquisite Corpses projects, which led to 2 recordings and
several live performances, working with such artists as Ikue Mori, Catherine
Jauniaux, and Anthony Coleman.
In 1993, he moved to the Netherlands, where he studied at the Royal
Conservatory in the Hague for two years, and remained there until 2000.
During this period, he focussed more on his compositions and installations,
performing extensively throughout Europe. He was also working at this time
as composer-in-residence for the Macarthur fellowship-winning choreographer
Elizabeth Streb, using only sounds based on the amplified or detected
movements of the dancers.
In 2000, Ostrowski returned to New York, where he took up with the Flying
Karamazov Brothers, world-renowned masters of juggling and cheap theatrics.
He served as their technology director, responsible for care and feeding of
their sensor-based equipment, serving as project manager for new technology,
developing video, and performing onstage, thankfully without having to
juggle.
He presently develops custom software for musicians and installations,
and spends most of his time in New York, counting his grammys, and coming
up with new ways to annoy his neighbors with new pieces.
He has performed from Australia to California, including the Melbourne
Festival, the Audio Art festival in Krakow, Sonic Acts in Amsterdam, New
Music America, the Festival Musiques Innovatrices in France, Stroom in
Switzerland, PS 1, Wien Modern, and many other venues worldwide. Ostrowski
has received fellowships from STEIM in Amsterdam, the Media Alliance in New
York, the New York Foundation for the Arts, and many others. He appears on
over a dozen recordings.