Natacha Diels’ work combines choreographed movement, improvisation, video, instrumental practice, and cynical play to create worlds of curiosity and unease. Recent work includes Papillon and the Dancing Cranes, for construction cranes and giant butterfly (Borealis Festival 2018); and forthcoming is a 6-part TV-style miniseries with the JACK quartet (TimeSpans Festival 2020) and a collaborative work for shadowed audience with Ensemble Pamplemousse (Darmstadt 2020). With a focus on collage, collaboration, and the ritual of life as art, Natacha’s compositions have been described as “a fairy tale for a fractured world” (Music We Care About) and “the liveliest music of the evening” (LA Review of Books).
Natacha is a founding member of the composer/performer collective Ensemble Pamplemousse (est. 2003). Pamplemousse specializes in unique aspects of new music composition, from complex virtuosic instrumental performance to experimental theatre to electronic and robotic performance.
Notable commissions include those from Borealis Festival for the aforementioned crane opera; the Fromm Foundation for an upcoming work for Talea Ensemble (2021); Nadar Ensemble for Darmstadt International Summer Institute [performed installation: I Love Myself Fully and Unconditionally] (2018); the Los Angeles Philharmonic for the green Umbrella Series [Laughing to Forget] (2018); and Deustchland Radio Kultur in Berlin for Ensemble Adapter [Sad Music for Lonely People] (2019). Other major activities include being chosen as artist-in-residence for Harvestworks in partnership with MATA festival (summer 2019) and a release by Ensemble Pamplemousse on which Natacha is featured as composer, performer, and video producer (Lost at Sea, TAK Editions 2019). Natacha’s work has been performed globally by Ensemble Adapter, Ensemble Intercontemporain, Nadar Ensemble, hand werk, Ensemble Decoder, TAK Ensemble, Quatuor Impact, JACK Quartet; and soloists Jay Campbell, Laura Cocks, Samuel Favre, Ross Karre, Rane Moore, and Charlotte Mundy, among others. She has created several short films and music videos which have been screened in Denmark, NYC, Chicago, Budapest, and Hungary.
Natacha holds degrees in performance, digital media, and composition from New York University and Columbia University.