Tim Mariën is a Belgian composer whose works unveil relationships between composition, tuning systems, microtonality and acoustic performance practice.

He started composing during his teens after discovering innovative composers like Pierre Henry, Luigi Nono and Karlheinz Stockhausen. While studying musicology at the Catholic University of Leuven he submerged himself in tuning systems, in particular extended just intonation. To put theoretical work into practice he learned the craft of piano technician. A meeting with the Italian composer Salvatore Sciarrino in 2002 inspired Mariën to intensify his participation in the world of contemporary classical music.

Over the next years he composed for several ensembles for which he occasionally adapted or retuned instruments to his own unique scales. Mariën's compositions have been performed at various festivals of contemporary classical music. In 2010, at the request of Belgium's Ictus ensemble, he completed his version of Harry Partch's The Wayward, which had an international tour along with his own composition Toeënwâs. In the same year he was awarded with a Kranichstein scholarship award for composition during the Darmstadt International Summer Courses for New Music. A long-standing collaboration with Tiptoe Company reached a provisional high point in 2020 with A Basement Suite, a collection of compositions that Mariën (re)wrote between 2012 and 2020. A participation in the festival Wien modern in the same year was, due to circumstances, replaced by a live stream event organised by ChampdAction in Antwerp.

The CD and vinyl record, which will be released in 2022 under the umbrella title 'A Basement Suite', brings together a number of pieces written between 2001-2020 that use original microtonal tunings, adapted instruments and composition techniques.