"Sofia Borges is a versatile musician active as a composer, performer, percussionist and sound designer. She focuses on interdisciplinary work and blending a variety of genres, traditions, materials and technologies. Her compositions cover a wide spectrum ranging from chamber, orchestra and vocal music up to theatre, dance and multimedia performances and installations. Sofia has participated in numerous international festivals all over Europe, U.S.A, Brazil, Macao, Taiwan, Australia and New Zealand. She was selected to take part in the TENSO Young Composers Workshop 2015 (Mechelen), 2016 (Marseille) and 2017 (Nova Gorica). When performing as a composer-performer, she not only uses self-programmed electronics but also instruments she has developed herself. Sofia is also a dedicated educator, having among other projects headed the composition lab with school children at Klangradar Berlin since 2015. Sofia Borges began studying Percussion and Drums in Lisbon both at the Conservatório Nacional de Lisboa and the Luís Villas-Boas Jazz School. Later she devoted herself to composition, studying at the Escola Superior de Música de Lisboa. In 2012 she completed her MA in Multimedia Composition at the Hamburg University of Music and Theater.

Sofia Borges lives in Berlin, Germany."

"My story is quite simple, I was living in São Paulo (Brazil) a big city with 21.000.000 people and a incredible concrete jungle and it happen to be playing music too, after many years playing Brazilian music, free improvisation started to take place in my music.

Waking up and sleeping with this constant noise that this huge city makes it was inevitable to not have it on my music. As any 3rd world citizen I had to improvise every day and that is what happen to my "forró" (Brasilian music from the north east), became more and more full of noises and freer in the form and content.

So in 2005 after recording "Abaetetuba" and "Contra Mão" I thought that it was time to leave São Paulo and meet some other improvisers around the world. Now I am based in Amsterdam but have been for two years in London where I spent most of my time making music with some amazing musicians as Marcio Mattos, Veryan Weston, John Edwards, Steve Noble, Mark Sanders and also was part of the London Improvisers Orchestra together with Lol Coxhill and Evan Parker between other great musicians from the London free improv scene, that was to me a great school.

This orchestra has inspired me to start the Royal Improvisers Orchestra (RIO) in Holland and it has been playing since 2006, with 20 musicians from all over the world and from completely individual angels of music with musicians from Baroque to Punk Noise but with the same passion for the improvisation.

Here in Holland, beside my fix groups RIO, Caetitu, Abaetetuba and EkE, I have also been playing with some great musicians that I have learned a lot from as Han Bennink, Michael Vatcher, Luc Ex, Marcos Baggiani, Ab Baars, Cor Fuhler and other ZAAL100 (our free improv place in Amsterdam) friends."