Biography

Dr Jodie Rottle (she/her) is a creative flutist, researcher, lecturer, composer, and improviser who explores the curious and surprising sounds of everyday objects. Sought after for her whimsical perspective, her work within music often extends into performance art, puppetry, circus, installation art, and interdisciplinary realms.

 Jodie is active within the Brisbane new music community, where she performs with two-time Queensland Music Award-winning and ABC TV Art Works-featured ensemble Matt Hsu’s Obscure Orchestra. Recently, she was awarded the Creative Sparks Grant through Brisbane City Council to compose a new pop-instrumental work with Obscure Orchestra and vocalist Erin Fitzsimon (aka INIGO), which will be premiered at the 2023 MELT Festival at the Brisbane Powerhouse. She is also currently a part of the alt-pop duo Miami Washing Machine with Erik Griswold, and she improvises with experimental trio It’s Science And Feelings. Until 2020, she was a member of Kupka's Piano, a Brisbane-based ensemble that focused on new Australian music. With Kupka’s Piano she commissioned over 35 new works—many by emerging composers—and performed nationally across Australia. Her recorded work with Kupka’s Piano can be heard on multiple podcasts with ABC Classic FM and on the album Braneworlds. Before relocating to Australia, she was a member of Dead Language, a New York-based trio where that improvised, composed, and performed interdisciplinary works that included everything from literature and white noise to toys and wolf howls. Dead Language performances took place across the USA at historic American Shaker villages, the Centre for Fiction NYC, and Seattle’s Wayward Music Series.

 Jodie enjoys an international career as an interdisciplinary composer and performer. A central theme of her work is the element of surprise, and some of her explorations as a composer-performer include prepared flutes and wearable sound objects. She recently developed a two-person outdoor show with Vulcana Circus, where she explored physical circus performance while playing original flute compositions. She was selected internationally as a 2022 winner of the Duo Alto (Israel) Call for Scores and was the recipient of the 2020 Boundary Riders Commission. She was also commissioned by the Brisbane Music Festival and the Brisbane Writers Festival to compose a new work inspired by the verse of Quandamooka spoken-word artist Ethan Enoch. Currently, Jodie is leading workshops with the 2023 Brisbane Festival production 10,000 Kazoos, where she facilitates community music making with everyday objects. She has performed with Bleach* Festival, Brisbane Music Festival, Dots+Loops, Camerata—Queensland’s Chamber Orchestra, Ensemble Offspring (Sydney), Queensland Ballet, and Philharmonia Australia, among others. She has appeared at the Bendigo International Festival of Exploratory Music; toured regionally with the Queensland Music Festival; and presented concerts at the Brisbane Festival of Toy Music. She annually performs at the Easter at the Piano Mill events in rural NSW, hosted by Harrigan’s Lane, where she has improvised with native birds and composed for moving mini-buses. She has presented her own participatory and embodied sound-based works at Made Now Music, Make It Up Club, RuckusFest, and the Listening Museum, among others. Her work as a composer is represented by the Australian Music Centre.

 As a researcher, Jodie focuses on working with the nonhuman in a creative music practice. She presented the Companion Thinking Symposium in 2023, where she brought together artists from different disciplines to discuss companionship and collaboration with the nonhuman. She is currently the Resident Adjunct at the Creative Arts Research Institute Griffith University, where she explores the intersection of her music practices with visual art, the Griffith Climate Action Beacon, and sound installation. In her research as a composer-performer, everyday objects become companion thinkers in the creation of new sound discoveries. She has presented her written work at conferences in North America and Australia and has recently co-authored an article published in Contemporary Music Review.

 Jodie’s career has offered opportunities to travel, study, and connect with communities across North America and Australia. She was the winner of the 2009 Coeur d’Alene Symphony Young Artist Concerto Competition (USA) and a finalist in the Carson Memorial Prize (Queensland), Seattle Flute Society Young Artist Competition, and the Tacoma Philharmonic Beatrice Hermann Recital Competition (USA). Jodie was awarded degrees from Griffith University (PhD), Manhattan School of Music (MM), SUNY Purchase College (Perf. Cert), and Pacific Lutheran University (BMus) where she was the recipient of both the Mary Baker Russell and James D. Holloway Memorial scholarships. She has been an Artist-in-Residence at the Bundanon Trust (Australia), Avaloch Farm Music Institute (USA), the Banff Centre (Canada), and the Bang on a Can Summer Institute (USA).

 Jodie currently lectures at JMC Academy, where she is a lecturer in the Master of Creative Industries and Entertainment Business Management courses. She also lectures at the Queensland Conservatorium in the Music Theory and Music Industry courses. She has given guest workshops at primary, secondary, and tertiary institutions in Queensland and has taught studio flute lessons for over 10 years. Jodie currently resides in Brisbane with her dog where she enjoys bouldering, sunshine, and connecting with her LGBTQI+ community.