Herman Witkam (born 19 March 1985) is a Dutch composer and

multi-instrumentalist A multi-instrumentalist is a musician who plays two or more musical instruments, often but not exclusively at a professional level of proficiency. Also known as woodwind doubler, doubling, the practice allows greater ensemble flexibility and mor ...

, best known for his scores to motion pictures. During his studies at the

Utrecht School of the Arts The Utrecht School for the Arts () is a performing arts and visual arts educational institution in City of Utrecht, Province of Utrecht, Netherlands. The school opened for student enrollment in September 1987. Overview The institution has 6 ...

, 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 Shriekfest Horror Film Festival was a film festival specializing in the Horror film, horror genre. It was one of the longest running horror festivals in Los Angeles, until 2021. In 2017, Shriekfest expanded to include an Orlando, FL festival loca ...

and

HollyShorts Film Festival The HollyShorts Film Festival is an annual Academy Awards-qualifying independent short film festival located in Hollywood, California. History Founded in 2005, the yearly festival programmes feature an eclectic mixture of short films of various ge ...

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 screened at the

BFI London Film Festival The BFI London Film Festival is an annual film festival held in London, England, in collaboration with the British Film Institute. Founded in 1957, the festival runs for two weeks every October. In 2016, the BFI estimated that around 240 fe ...

and

Fantastic Fest Fantastic Fest is an annual film festival in Austin, Texas, focused on fantasy, horror, sci-fi, action and cult films, the largest genre festival in the United States. It was founded in 2005 by Tim League of Alamo Drafthouse. Lisa Dreyer ...

, and was named one of the top 15 festival horror films of 2012 by

Bloody Disgusting Bloody Disgusting is an American independent multi-media company, which began as a horror genre-focused news website specializing in information services that covered various horror media. The company expanded into other media including podcast ...

. 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. Witkam also scored the youth drama ''Spijt (Regret)'', which received grand prizes at the

Giffoni Film Festival The Giffoni International Film Festival is an Italian children's film festival which takes place annually in Giffoni Valle Piana, Campania. It began in 1971. The Giffoni International Film Festival typically has around 100,000 guests and has ...

, the

Toronto International Film Festival The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF, often stylized as tiff) is one of the most prestigious and largest publicly attended film festivals in the world. Founded in 1976, the festival takes place every year in early September. The organi ...

's TIFF Kids and the

European Film Award The European Film Awards (or European Film Academy Awards) have been presented annually since 1988 by the European Film Academy to recognize excellence in European cinematic achievements. The awards are given in 19 categories, of which the most ...

in the youth category, amongst a total of around 30 festival awards worldwide.

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 Improvisation, often shortened to improv, is the activity of making or doing something not planned beforehand, using whatever can be found. The origin of the word itself is in the Latin "improvisus", which literally means un-foreseen. Improvis ...

as a composing technique. As a multi-instrumentalist, Herman has performed on video game titles such as

Mortal Kombat 11 ''Mortal Kombat 11'' is a 2019 fighting game developed by NetherRealm Studios and published by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment. It is the eleventh main installment in the ''Mortal Kombat'' series and a sequel to '' Mortal Kombat X'' (20 ...

, 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 ''The King Maker'' ( Thai: กบฎท้าวศรีสุดาจันทร์), or ''The Rebellion of Queen Sudachan'', is a 2005 Thai historical drama film set during the Ayutthaya kingdom. With a storyline that shares many similaritie ...

Selected filmography

Awards and nominations

Awards

*2010

- Best music - ''A Little Mouth to Feed'' *2010

- Best Music - ''Rekindled'' *2011 Eindhoven Film Festival - Best Music - ''Prosopagnosia''

Nominations

*2008

Action On Film International Film Festival The Action On Film International Film Festival, also known as the Action On Film Festival, was founded in 2004. It was held in California until 2017 when it moved to the Palms Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas. As a hub for many returning filmmake ...

Best Music - ''Berlin''

References

External links

* *
Score Magazine Interview
(in Dutch) {{DEFAULTSORT:Witkam, Herman Dutch film score composers Dutch male film score composers Living people 1985 births