• recordings
  • performing
    • The Echoes Project 2017/2018
    • Fine Blue Thread Trio
    • Enfold - Opal Vapour Artists
    • Opal Vapour
  • teaching
  • Embodied rhythm workshops
  • contact
RIA SOEMARDJO
  • recordings
  • performing
    • The Echoes Project 2017/2018
    • Fine Blue Thread Trio
    • Enfold - Opal Vapour Artists
    • Opal Vapour
  • teaching
  • Embodied rhythm workshops
  • contact
RIA SOEMARDJO
Ria Soemardjo is a Melbourne based musician with a passion for collaborating with artists across diverse range of genres and artforms. Her  distinct, haunting vocal style reflects her Australian/Indonesian cultural heritage and she draws on her fascination for Indonesian musical traditions in her song writing and collaborative projects. 

​ of frogs   new performance
​7-17th September 2022
book now
I am very excited to share this new work - inspired by frogs and our waterways.  Over the last year, we have been gradually creating eerie, mesmerising and playful soundscapes and songs.  Voice, percussion & shadow play interacting with water.
Created with Sandra Fiona Long with percussionists - Jeremy Dullard & Ron Reeves. 
Presented by Darebin Arts Speakeasy.
KP productions.


Sanctuary -  short film
 2021. Devised by Ria Soemardjo, multi-layered sound compositions featuring gamelan instruments, voice and Ron Reeves on khene (Thai reed instrument) and percussion, are woven with Jon’s text and movement. Cinematography by Max Milne.
​'As a child, growing up in a remote Thai village, actress Jon (Pongjit Saphakhun) recalls a magical time, spending hours playing under a huge fragrant moon fruit tree. Ceremonies in her village were often chaotic, joyful social events, reflecting an intimate, direct relationship with the natural world – and a deep respect for trees. Now in Melbourne, Jon listens for this connection in the trees she encounters on her walks.'

murmuring walk    guided audio walk soundtrack
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Created in collaboration with  Charlotte Roberts and Sandra Fiona Long. Murmuring Walk is an audio-guided walk reflecting the environment, birdlife and natural rhythms of Sanatorium lake, Mount Macedon
This beautiful  guided walk can be experienced at any time > >

swallow walk    guided audio walk soundtrack
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Created in iso, Swallow Walk is an audio-guided experience of Edwardes Lake in Reservoir, inspired by the lake’s surrounding environment and its migratory birds including the Welcome Swallows that flit over the lake, especially at springtime. Created in collaboration with writer  Sandra Fiona Long, launched in November 2020, culminating in a beautiful live event incorporating  the recorded audio and the sound of  gongs and other gamelan instruments resonating across the lake. 
 Commissioned and funded by Darebin Arts for HYPERLOCAL – a new series of immersive art works that invites audiences to see Darebin differently. Presented by FUSE Darebin.         
swallow walk info and free audio download

'Cosmic spectacle and apocalyptic majesty in the land of the dead'​
Sydney Morning Herald
Ria  performed in Asiatopa Festival February 2020 -  Hades Fading/Hades Memudar.  Indonesia/Australia collaboration with Mainteater company, This exciting bilingual play was developed and premiered in Bandung  in 2019.
​ Ria worked with director /writer Sandra Long, guzheng player Sisca Harp, and the dynamic Mainteater actors, including Bandung poet Godi Suwarna to create live music & vocal soundscapes for this production.

 rhythm

resonance

Connecting with our innate sense of rhythm....
I offer workshops in  the TaKeTiNa Rhythm process, as developed by world renouned percussionist and rhythm educator - Reinhardt Flatischler.
upcoming workshops
Voice/Intention/Breath/Expression...
Private sessions for people seeking to explore their vocal potential. 
​I draw on my intensive training as a teacher of the Alexander Technique - used world wide as an approach to refining our kinaesthetic intelligence as we move/sound/ think.
enquiries

Performing  with Melbourne Community Gamelan and their visiting teacher - the multi-talented  Danis Sugiyanto. Wayang Kulit (shadow puppet theatre) is one of my favourite events - incorporating live gamelan, beautiful puppets, improvised comedy, epic stories. Here is one of the  highlights for me, Danis is accompanying me singing one  a very popular solo Javanese song, on violin, in his own unique style...

recent/current projects

The Echoes Project 2019 - Seafarer's Welcome
Hades Fading - Indonesia
Indigenous celebration tour - 2018 Bali/Kalimantan
Fine Blue Thread - contemporary world music
Surat-surat - Rani Pramesti and Ron Reeves.
Chinese Whispers - sound design/composition - a digital, bilingual graphic novel
The Echoes Project : Mapping Melbourne Festival December 2017
Enfold - collaboration with Opal Vapour Artists
All Ria’s work integrates, in quite an exquisite way, an aesthetic coming directly from an Asian tradition (with which she has cultural links) and her Australian context. This kind of work enriches the culturally diverse landscape in Australia  and opens new possibilities. It is breathtakingly beautiful, and deserves to be fostered in order to continue and grow....Ria is an artist of great skill and humility, who is quite unique in her ideas, talents and dedication to her work.  (Bagryana Popov 2002)

past projects

contemporary ceremony
Opal Vapour
'Moths are calling' - collaboration with dance artist Janette Hoe
Sedih|Sunno - Rani P Collaborations
Solo Performance/installation - Nocturne Festival, Dandenong
Tower Suites - Ros Warby and Helen Mountfort. Green room award 2014


Teaching

Upcoming workshops/classes
About TaKeTiNa

Voice/Alexander Technique lessons

Performance

Current Projects
< Fine Blue Thread trio
< Enfold


Contact

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