Reinbert de Leeuw in Zomergasten, not in Muziekzomer

In just over two weeks, the NJO Music Summer, with more than sixty-five concerts performed by young musicians, spread across more and less obvious locations in the province of Gelderland. One hundred and sixty young people flocked from all over the world to show their skills from 1 to 17 August. Anyone staying in Gelderland at that time could not possibly miss their presence.

There are performances at former factory sites, such as the Zoetenlaboratorium in Arnhem, the Zwitsal terrain in Apeldoorn and the Honig complex in Nijmegen. There is also the Veluvine Cycle Tour, which has grown into a tradition and takes the sporty music lover past four different open-air concerts around Nunspeet. This year, Doorwerth Castle also presents a cycle route along three musical performances in the municipality of Renkum. The Beekberg Gardens, Radio Kootwijk and the Amphitheatre of museum Kröller-Muller are equally appealing locations.

Like every season, there is another Young artist in residence, Romanian-born pianist Andrea Vasi. She gives nearly 20 concerts, playing works by such diverse luminaries as Beethoven and Shostakovich, but also venturing into Romanian folk music and crossover. Composer in residence is Rob Zuidam, whose works include the much-praised but so far only once-performed Canciones del Alma comes to life. Zuidam's muse Katrien Baerts signs for the performances, together with the NJO Chamber Orchestra conducted by Antony Hermus. The Stolz Quartet revisits the - instrumental - opera A Love Unsung.

Artistic director Xian Zhang conducts the NJO Symphony Orchestra in works by Brahms and Schumann and Karol Szymanowski's First Violin Concerto, with soloist Rosanne Philippens. Zhang took over in 2011 from Reinbert de Leeuw, who set up the NJO Summer Academy in 2001 together with then business director Arthur van Dijk. This was inspired by the summer courses at the American Tanglewood, where De Leeuw was head of the contemporary music department from 1994 to 1998.

Right from the very first season, he managed to engage internationally renowned coaches such as Flemish conductor Philippe Herrewege, Italian pianist Igor Roma and Hungarian composer György Kurtág for the NJO Summer Academy. That year, the summer school attracted some one hundred and twenty participants, three quarters of whom came from the Netherlands; now the ratio is exactly the other way round.

For the fourteenth edition - after rigorous selection - musicians were admitted from Mexico to Russia and from Britain to Serbia. Notable absentees this year, incidentally, are conductor and pianist Reinbert de Leeuw, whose performance last year in his own cycle Im wunderschönen Monat Mai also already fell through due to illness of actress Katja Herbers.

Perhaps The Lion is too busy preparing for his episode of VPRO Summer guests which takes place in the middle of the NJO Music Summer, on 10 August next. After all, filling three hours with film footage you find so impressive that you want to share it with the whole world is by no means an easy task. In NRC Handelsblad he said he will show excerpts on the theme of "people crossing the border, looking for how things can be done differently".

De Leeuw's admiration for the maverick, the man or woman who follows his or her own path averse to all currents, runs like a thread through his career. This fascination also speaks from the interviews I conducted with him last year about his beloved composers, for three full-length concerts of the VPRO on Radio 4. With each recording, he effortlessly distils why it so appeals to him, whether it is a radical work by Charles Ives, an atonal piece by Arnold Schoenberg or a gossamer fabric of sound by Sofia Gubaidoelina. He will no doubt also provide the selected film clips with appropriate and inspiring commentary.

Curious to see if De Leeuw will show recordings of his work with young people, as that too is a constant in his now more than 50-year career. Left or right, it will be a glowing music summer!

Good to know:

In March 2014, my biography 'Reinbert de Leeuw: man or melody', in which I pay ample attention to De Leeuw's involvement with Tanglewood and with the NJO Summer Academy. If you purchase the book via this link, you also support Culture Press.