David is a multiform musician, dedicated to composition, performance, research, and education.
He has pursued learning Javanese and Japanese music alongside his Western training as a composer and performer. He is a shakuhachi student of Sensei Kaoru Kakizakai and Okuda Atsuya, and was composer-in-residence for Osaka-based Gamelan ensembles, Marga Sari and Dharma Budaya. These residencies culminated in performances at the 2008 Space Ten New Music Festival, where he was a featured composer and performer.
Between 2013 and 2014, he wrote a trio of song cycles that received critical acclaim. The first, Koibitotachi (The Lovers), is inspired by the Japanese tanka poetic form, and imagines a correspondence between lovers, a Japanese woman and a French man.
Lagu Cinta (Love Songs) is a contemporary reinvention of traditional Indonesian art forms of song and ritual. The words of contemporary Indonesian poet, Sitok Srengenge, are set for for soprano, tenor, and slendro gamelan. The two song cycles reveal sensuality primarily concealed in Kotlowy's earlier work, and were premiered in an evening of his music, Heart to Heart, OzAsia Festival 2013.
The third piece in the cycle, Mitithi (Stolen), described as "a devastating vocal meditation on the desolation of Indigenous people", was premiered by Halcyon Ensemble and Soundstream Collective in Adelaide and Sydney in 2014.
In 2018, Patina, a cross-cultural collaboration with calligrapher and visual artist Juno Oka, choreographers Ade Suharto and Shin Sakuma, premiered at OzAsia Festival 2018. Highly praised, it was shortlisted for the 2018 Adelaide Critics Circle Award for Innovation.
David was awarded the ArtsSA Fellowship in 2019. He has been composing and performing on microtonal guitar since 2023.
His music is available on de la Catessen records and via Bandcamp.