Bio

Omar Medina is a composer, producer, and performer working at the intersection of electronic music, experimental sound design, and live performance. Based in Amsterdam and originally from Mexico, his current work centers on building generative systems in Max/MSP, modular synthesis, and processed field recordings that act as collaborators in the studio and on stage, shaping compositions that move between stillness and rupture, structure and disorder.

A lifelong guitarist, Omar studied jazz guitar in Mexico City before moving to Amsterdam to pursue a Master's in Live Electronics at the Conservatorium van Amsterdam. Along the way, he has performed in numerous ensembles and stage productions, and worked within the production structures of theatre companies. That experience shaped his instinct for pacing, tension, and the relationship between sound and space.

Today, his practice moves between two strands. As a composer, he continues to build a body of work preoccupied with displacement, memory, and adaptation, and with the unstable territory between the analog and the digital. Alongside this, he performs and promotes traditional Mexican music through La Fandanguera, a project rooted in the music he grew up with.

His debut album, Goleb, released on 24 September 2026, is the first full statement of this practice.

Because

I am intrigued by the moments when familiar structures become unstable: identities shift, familiar ways of understanding the world are disrupted, and boundaries between opposing states become blurred. My work explores the tension between permanence and change: the desire for continuity within the necessity of transformation. 

Growing up during the transition from an analog world into an increasingly digital one has deeply shaped my understanding of change. The shift from physical and visible technologies toward increasingly invisible systems has created a continuous process of adaptation, one that never quite keeps pace with the speed of change itself. This experience was intensified when I relocated from Mexico to the Netherlands, where language, culture, and social relationships demanded a different form of reorientation. 

While the guitar has been a compass throughout all these transitions, electronic instruments have become my preferred medium because they allow me to work with sound in ways that are less constrained by the performance traditions attached to acoustic instruments. More importantly, they have changed the way I think about music. They have opened possibilities that reshaped not only the sounds I create but the way I conceive rhythm, time, and musical form. 

To explore these possibilities, I build custom systems in Max/MSP that act as generative collaborators, creating situations that I respond to in real time. Combined with modular synthesizers, field recordings, and processed samples, these systems allow me to compose not only with sounds but with the conditions that generate them. 

Coming from a background in jazz and traditional Mexican music, where improvisation often functions as both form and content, I approach electronic instruments through the same principle: negotiating between intention and uncertainty. Rather than seeking complete control over the outcome, I create conditions where unexpected events can become part of the composition. I welcome error, repetition, and unpredictability as essential elements of the creative process. 

My music tends toward slow, dark, and occasionally abrasive sonic landscapes, often interrupted by bursts of rhythmic intensity and densely layered textures. These contrasts create passages that suggest movement, atmosphere, and spatial depth, allowing the listener to experience sound as something beyond the purely auditory. 

My work is an ongoing exploration of changing states. Through sound, I seek moments where uncertainty becomes a space for discovery and transformation. 

Live

Past Shows

• 2025OT301, Amsterdam — Solo performance at Unknown Electronics
• 2024Het Concertgebouw, Amsterdam — Composition and spatial sound collective composition & performance at the workshop Space as a Collective Sonic Instrument
• 2023Nationale Opera & Ballet, Amsterdam — Solo performance at Opera Forward Festival
• 2023Zaal 100, Amsterdam — Solo performance at Jardin Rouge Festival
• 2022Kunstinstituut Melly, Rotterdam — Solo performance at Museumnacht 2022