Equally at home playing Rachmaninov on a concert stage as experimenting with tonal textures and electronics in her bands Vertex, MezzopTrio, Journey, Three Reflections, Yellow Beasts, and many more, Iranian born pianist and composer Setareh Nafisi (Tehran, Iran, 1987) began her musical journey at the age four, studying piano, violin, vocal and percussion, then touring internationally with Tehran Symphony Orchestra, Tehran Vocal Ensemble and and Tehran Choir.
A desire for discovering music and art in diverse pathways led Nafisi to explore her own artistic identity, first with a bachelor in piano studies from Tehran Art University, and then a second bachelor from the Prins Claus Conservatoire (Groningen, NL), this time incorporating studies in improvisation and composition. She then took further study in composition for film at Amsterdam Conservatoire (CvA), and is currently completing a Masters research in composition. In her practice as a composer, improviser and multi-disciplinary artist she utilises both electronic and acoustic elements in order to best tell each individual narrative.
Currently based in Groningen, NL, Setareh has composed for award winning short films, dance, cross-arts projects, concert settings, and regularly performs her own compositions with ensembles and her bands. She is also the founder of ‘The World We Live In’, a socially engaged community arts foundation with outreach and educational features, through which she is teaching a module at Prins Claus Conservatory. Nafisi’s compositions draw together all the threads of her musical journey, incorporating influences from classical, jazz, electronics and Eastern disciplines. Inspired by her multi- faceted cultural journey, she is forever searching for a broader musical vocabulary with which to communicate her stories to the new audiences of today.