What an incredible bucket of guts Lucie Horsch has. Twenty years old. Quite world-famous by now, admittedly. But you just have to dare, in your acceptance speech for the prestigious Dutch Music Prize, to throw the minister's just-expressed words back in her face. Because that is what Lucie Horsch did, with a controlled fury that made a deep impression even from 25 metres away.
The minister, who in her speech had praised Lucie's individuality, her determination not to obey rules, got back from the same Lucie that she is precisely the one who is stifling free art because of rule ticking. The room full of 30 directors and dignitaries was breathless. Astonished at first, then enthusiastic: she dares what nobody sitting there dared to do, not even the Holland Festival itself, host of this event, which is being cut by half a million euros by the Culture Council for totally unclear reasons.
Determined
Anyway: she posted her speech online here. Go read and shudder. No reason to despair about the new generation of post-millennials, if they have even a fraction of the determination of Lucie Horsch.
And in case you are not yet convinced of the greatness of this recorder genius, let me try to describe how it worked. The venue is the Muziekgebouw aan het IJ in Amsterdam, stripped of everything that makes the building fine: an empty hall, 30 people two and a half metres apart on the balcony, the music on the flattened floor in the depths.
Or no, let me go back a little further that afternoon: 30 people on 30 chairs in the Kleine Zaal of the Muziekgebouw, looking at the wall where a projection screen hangs. On it the live stream of some 15 singers of Cappella Amsterdam, separated from the audience in the Great Hall below, giving a beautiful performance of a hitherto unknown work by Louis Andriessen. Seemingly simple, made for a play, this opens a short but deeply impressive concert that otherwise features much medieval work.
Music that sounds wonderful, but at times a bit overbearing after the minimalist purity of Andriessen's 1980's Un Beau Baiser.
Depth
After the interval, the 30, including the minister, sat on the balcony of the Great Hall. Down below in the depths: 15 musicians from The Orchestra of the Eighteenth Century - like Cappella, threatened in its existence. Only string instruments, and only musicians resident in the Netherlands: the rest are either dangerous (horns) or under international lockdown. The orchestra sounds beautiful, though we will only hear at the very end how beautiful it could sound even more beautiful.
Lucie Horsch, who before her speech played an insanely complicated piece Louis Andriessen wrote especially for Frans Brüggen (Sweet), performed a miracle after her speech. I cannot put it any other way. The Concerto in D Major for Flute and Strings by Johann Sebastian Bach, arranged by Frans Brüggen, turned into a rousing dance piece by Horsch's fury and temperament. She took the orchestra in tow, producing a vibrant spectacle that moved to the bone.
That is what live music is capable of, even in a painfully empty hall due to pandemic. This is why we all need to go back to theatres and concert halls. Here you experience what you will never really experience on a stream or sound recording: musicians suddenly filled with energy rising above themselves, thanks to a 20-year-old with a recorder. And a big mouth.
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