Today we’d like to introduce you to Derek Torsani.
Hi Derek, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
Born in 1989, I became an artist in the 90’s with the backs of napkins as my canvas for drawing, tabletops and pens a medium for beat making. Around the turn of the millennium I borrowed a proper drum kit from a family friend. With it I started my first band, and with my dad built a website for our band in Adobe Dreamweaver.
It wasn’t long before I traded the drums for a guitar, and the napkins for a computer making graphic arts, following in the footsteps of my recently deceased uncle. Throughout high school, I continued making album art and show flyer designs for bands I was a part of.
Now, the year 2008, I dangerously applied to only one college, the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore, Maryland. They must have resonated with my definition of art and my ambitious portfolio because I was accepted into the Graphic Design program. Just three and a half years later, I graduated with a Bachelor’s in Fine Arts from MICA with a dream to work on films designing title sequences.
I entered the design industry doing motion graphics for a small video production firm. Not quite Hollywood, but a job. At the same time, I was touring locally in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States with my two-man folk band. The more my bandmate and I settled into our careers, the quieter the music got.
After spending time in motion graphics and filmmaking, I revisited the roots of my studies practicing graphic design on an in-house team in Miami, and then back to the origins of my internet presence as a web designer at a small agency in DC. Soon after, I joined a tech startup, as a desire formed to be dedicated to and iterate on a single product. It was there that I learned the value of design systems.
As the sole designer at a small company, I did just about everything, and efficiency and collaboration proved to be incredibly important. I worked alongside a team of engineers to develop the first design system I would work on. The years following, I continued to build systems to help designers and engineers work better together at all sizes of tech companies. Various positions and roles led me to join the Wikimedia Foundation where I lead visual and system design for Wikipedia and sister products.
Let’s rewind the tape back to around 2018, when I dusted off my instruments, and began making music again. I used every day of one week to produce a different song and released the project. Little did I know this practice, along with attending many local concerts would rekindle my love for writing and playing music myself.
I began writing a series of poems summing up personal experiences from the previous few years which would transform into a collaborative project becoming my debut album, Seeds, released in April of 2021. Seeds is around 38 minutes of ambient, jazzy improvisations, some created to the visuals of Sound Color Project, a piece of technology I created to translate the audible spectrum into the visual one.
During the pandemic, I would continue collaborating with other artists to release an alternative single with a remote friend and a jazz EP protesting the killings of Black folks. At one of the pre-COVID concerts I went to I met someone who would soon after become not only a musical collaborator but a close friend. We would meet in their basement every week to talk about life and record rough demos from instrumentals I had been producing. Only a few years later, this friend passed away. On what would have been their next birthday, I released a posthumous full length album called New Life from the demos we recorded over the previous years.
By this point, I had moved back to Baltimore to build a home and a family with my partner. While time became limited, my ability to make music did as well. Any creative time I could find was dedicated to a project I had begun conceptualizing before having a kid—a children’s book and accompanying music. I again collaborated with a singer and an illustrator to bring my vision to life, and released the book and album for A Tree Like Me in the Fall of 2025.
Most recently, I curated a music concert where a number of artists performed for roughly ten minutes each. I closed the show with a composition from a classical guitar album I released in the Spring of 2026 called Fruit & Labor.
I’m currently working on what’s next. Still designing professionally and playing music recreationally.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
My biggest challenges have been navigating becoming a parent and balancing my time for creative endeavors. My biggest obstacle has always been myself, my need for perfection and being my own toughest critic.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I think I answered a lot of this in the first prompt but I’ll see if I can add anything else here.
I tend to not be great at any one thing, but decently good at a lot of things. This means I can do a lot of different things, like build my own websites, produce albums, publish a children’s book, and other random things. I’m able to do all of this as a parent because my partner supports my souls need to express creatively.
What matters most to you?
My family. Music. Being my authentic self.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://derektorsani.com
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/derektorsani/
- Other: https://derektorsani.bandcamp.com/
