Biography
The New York Times proclaims "Rafiq Bhatia is writing his own musical language," heralding him as "one of the most intriguing figures in music today." A guitarist, producer, and Academy Award-nominated composer "who refuses to be pinned to one genre, culture or instrument," Bhatia makes sculptural, meticulously crafted music that finds common ground among ecstatic avant-garde jazz, mournful soul, fractured beats and building-shaking electronics. "He treats his guitar, synthesizers, drum machines and electronic effects as architectural elements," the Times writes. "Sound becomes contour; music becomes something to step into rather than merely follow."
Bhatia's first LP for Anti- Records, 2018's Breaking English, has been described as "stunningly focused...a vibrant new instrumental sound world where crushing beats, nimble guitar licks, and shifting electronic textures coalesce with a visceral bite" (Chicago Reader). His subsequent release, 2020's Standards Vol. 1 EP, renders repertoire from the American songbook "completely deconstructed, infused with brand new textures and electronic effects, dreamlike and beautiful" (BBC). In 2025 he presents Each Dream, A Melting Door, his first solo release since co-scoring 2023's Academy Award-winning Best Picture, Everything Everywhere All At Once. Across the EP's five tracks, Bhatia and pianist Chris Pattishall improvise to conjure environments of sound that evolve at nature's pace-but crucially-also carry its unpredictable stakes. Unfurling seamlessly like a short film, the result is sculptural, sleepwalking music that rewards patience and deep listening, illuminating fleeting pathways towards the journey inward.
In the five years since his last solo release, Bhatia has collaborated with a beguiling breadth of artists with little in common other than their iconoclastic outputs. As a member of the experimental pop outfit Son Lux, together with whom he earned Oscar and BAFTA nominations for their head-spinning Everything Everywhere score, Bhatia has worked with David Byrne, André Benjamin, and Mitski. On Blue, Bhatia's collaboration with Thai master director Apichatpong Weerasethakul, was recently performed live by Alarm Will Sound during back-to-back nights at BAM's Howard Gilman Opera House, while the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater internationally toured a twenty minute work set to selections from Bhatia's 2020 EP, Standards Vol. I. Since its release, Bhatia has continued to deepen his engagement with jazz, appearing alongside Ambrose Akinmusire, Dave Douglas, Ganavya, James Brandon Lewis, and Samora Pinderhughes in addition to producing arresting debut records for Pattishall and trumpeter Riley Mulherkar.
As a composer, Bhatia has been commissioned by the Kronos Quartet, Walker Art Center, Public Records, the Kennedy Center, Jennifer Koh, Liquid Music Series, National Sawdust, Newfields, The Jazz Gallery, Toledo Museum of Art, and more. A voracious collaborator working across musical communities and artistic disciplines, Bhatia has also created with Arooj Aftab, Holland Andrews, Michael Cina, Teju Cole, Sam Dew, Billy Hart, Marcus Gilmore, Shahzad Ismaily, Vijay Iyer, Glenn Kotche, Okkyung Lee, Qasim Naqvi, Helado Negro, Kassa Overall, Cécile McLorin Salvant, Valgeir Sigurðsson, Alex Somers, Moses Sumney, Rajna Swaminathan, Kiah Victoria, David Virelles and others. He has contributed to recordings on Brownswood, City Slang, ECM, Glassnote, Greenleaf Music, Joyful Noise, New Amsterdam, RCA and Temporary Residence Ltd.
Bhatia is a Jerome Foundation Composer/Sound Artist Fellow, and a former artist-in-residence at Duke Performances. He has been invited to speak by the National Gallery of Art, Big Ears Festival, Berklee College of Music, Melbourne International Jazz Festival and IUPUI, and is currently adjunct faculty of the New School's Performer-Composer Master of Music program. His music is published in association with Domino Publishing Company.
A native of North Carolina, Bhatia lives in Brooklyn, New York.
