Herman Witkam

Herman Witkam
Born 19 March 1985
Origin Leiden, Netherlands
Genres Film scores
Occupation(s) Composer, Multi-instrumentalist, Sound designer, producer
Instruments Duduk, Shakuhachi, Guitar, Bass Guitar, Udu, Quena, Bawu, Hulusi, Low whistle, Native American flute, Recorder, Fujara, Darabuka
Years active 2005–present

Herman Witkam (born 19 March 1985) is a Dutch composer and multi-instrumentalist, best known for his scores to motion pictures. During his studies at the Utrecht School of the Arts, Witkam worked on a number of online shorts through the DVXUser online film festivals. For two of these films, Rekindled and A Little Mouth to Feed, both directed by Jack Daniel Stanley, Witkam won awards at the Shriekfest and HollyShorts Film Festival respectively.

Career

After graduating, Witkam started working mainly on feature films and television drama, but also documentaries, such as Eric Walter's My Amityville Horror, which screeened at the BFI London Film Festival and Fantastic Fest, and was named one of the top 15 festival horror films of 2012 by Bloody Disgusting.[1] The Dutch mobile phone thriller APP, for which Witkam composed a hybrid score of orchestra and electronics was released in a limited theatrical run in the US on May 9, 2014, and uses audio digital watermarking technology to give viewers a fully integrated second screen that complements the film.[2] Witkam also scored the youth drama Spijt (Regret), which received grand prizes at the Giffoni Film Festival, the Toronto International Film Festival's TIFF Kids and the European Film Award in the youth category, amongst a total of around 30 festival awards worldwide.[3]

Ethnic Instruments

Witkam frequently uses traditional musical instruments like the Armenian duduk and Japanese shakuhachi in his work, which he performs himself, often using improvisation as a composing technique. As a multi-instrumentalist, Herman has performed on video game titles such as Total War Rome II and Dungeons & Dragons Tactics, and internationally co-produced pictures such as The Seven of Daran: Battle of Pareo Rock and The King Maker.

Selected filmography

Film
Year Title
2010 Golden Earrings
2011 Train to Stockholm
2011 Mila's Journey
2011 Claustrofobia
2012 My Amityville Horror
2012 Mike Says Goodbye
2012 Class of Fun
2013 Regret
2013 APP
2013 Sensei Redenshon
2013 Class of Fun Goes Camping
2014 Painkillers

Awards and nominations

Awards

Nominations

References

  1. ↑ Mitchell, Cory (December 28, 2012). "Corey Mitchell’s Top 15 Festival Horror Films of 2012". Bloody Disgusting.
  2. ↑ Mitchell, Robert (March 11, 2013). "Don’t Turn Off Your Phone During This Horror Pic". Variety.
  3. ↑ Dijksterhuis, Edo (March 31, 2014). "Spijt! uitgeroepen tot beste Europese jeugdfilm". De Filmkrant (in Dutch).

External links