NEW NUTS AMSTERDAM AND SQUARE THEATRE PRESENT THE FIRST 'LEAF & WIND FESTIVAL'

The 1st Leaf & Wind Festival!
New Notes Amsterdam at the Plein Theatre 

Nieuwe Noten Amsterdam (NNA), the monthly concert series for contemporary chamber music, presents the 'Leaf & Blazers Festival' for the first time in their six-year existence. A four-day musical event taking place from Thursday 16 to Sunday 19 October 2025 at the Plein Theater in Amsterdam Oost. With a programme of established (inter-) national musicians, young talent and crossovers with visual arts and dance, curators Aspasia Nasopoulou (composer) and Fie Schouten (bass clarinetist) will give inspiring new music and compositions a stage.

"The Plein Theatre is in the middle of an Amsterdam working-class neighbourhood. For me as a wind player (clarinetist), I thought it would be fun to put instruments from a wind band in the spotlight in our first festival. By doing so, I hope to offer a coherent and diverse programme to the people who come to listen and also inspire them to start playing a wind instrument themselves! The title 'Leaf & Wind' is a nod to the fact that some of the musicians in the festival play from leaf (music) and outside (October) the leaves are blown off the trees." Fie Schouten (curator)

PROGRAMME LEAF & WIND FESTIVAL

Thu 16 - Sun 19 Oct 2025 | Plein Theater Amsterdam

NNA Leaf & Blazers Festival | Young & Promising
Thursday 16 October 20:30 - 21:30 hrs
Line up: Jaime Peña Martínez (clarinet & composition) ism Guillermo Martín-Viana (visual arts) | Femke van den Bergh (bass clarinet solo) | Luis Miguel Aguilar, Brennan Hamilton-Smith (bass clarinet duo)

The four (bass) clarinetists in this programme are at the beginning of their careers. Jaime Peña Martínez comes with his programme (Not) an Answer, an audiovisual journey that invites you to explore spirituality, magical-religious thinking and its place in modern Western life. Meditative, profound and accessible. Femke van den Bergh's performances include People of this place by Australian Felicity Wilcox, an aural reflection on Sydney's multicoloured cultural heritage. Luis Miguel Aguilar and Brennan Hamilton-Smith are master jazz students of bass clarinetist Joris Roelofs (Conservatorium van Amsterdam). They will close the programme with a jazz duo.

This concert is also part of the Bass Clarinet Festival.

NNA Leaf & Blazers Festival | Flute & Traverso
Friday, 17 October 20:30 - 21:30 hrs
Line up: Anne La Berge (flute & electronics), Dorota Matejová (traverso & electronics), La Berge and Matejová close the concert together 

Anne La Berge - solo recital flute & electronics, own compositions
La Berge is a founding member of the musician collective Splendor Amsterdam. Her passion for the extremes in both composed and improvised music has led her to the edges of storytelling and sound art as her musical inspirations. 

Dorota Matejová - solo recital traverso & voice & audiotapes
Dorota Matejová specialises in the traverso (flute), which she fell in love with for its fragile, warm, human-voice-like sound. Exploring the extended sonorities of this instrument was also a subject of her acclaimed master's thesis THE LIMITS OF TRAVERSO; Exploring the Sound Possibilities of Traverso through Contemporary Music (2020). 

NNA Leaf & Wind Festival| Composed & Improvised
Saturday 18 October 20:30 - 21:30 hrs
Line up: Ties Mellema (saxophone) ism Thomas Myrmel (sound), Annette Maye (bass clarinet) & Carl-Ludwig Hübsch (tuba)

Ties Mellema saxophone & electronics, own compositions & improvisations

Ties Mellema is indisputably a virtuoso on the saxophone. He has received many awards, including the prestigious Dutch Music Prize. Like La Berge, Mellema is also a co-founder of Splendor. Thomas Myrmel is a composer who unleashes his compositional techniques not only on music but also on text, dance, film and visual media. Together with Anat Spiegel, Thomas founded the experimental rock group Controllar. He is also a co-founder of the Amsterdam-based composer collective Monotak. His expertise as a performing artist is electronic music.

Annette Maye & Carl-Ludwig Hübsch: bass clarinet + tuba

Both musicians hail from Cologne. They are both also organisers and curators respectively of a festival for creative clarinet music (Festival Multiphonics since 2013) and in a concert series at Atelier Dürrenfeld Cologne (avant-garde jazz). This duo of highly experienced and versatile musicians fits well with Ties Mellema & Thomas Myrmel's set, also looking for unusual sounds on their instruments. 

NNA Leaf & Wind Festival| Orpheus Down (Ian Wilson, NL Premiere)
Sunday 19 October 15:00 - 16:00 hrs
Line up: Dario Calderone (double bass) & Gareth Davis (bass clarinet)

Dario Calderone is one of the most representative double bass players of his generation. Trained as a classical performing musician, he decided early in his career to focus on new experimental techniques and the repertoire of the last 40 years.

Gareth Davis studied with Antony Pay and Roger Heaton in London and then with Dutch bass clarinet virtuoso Harry Sparnaay in Amsterdam. He was invited by French cellist Alain Meunier to attend the prestigious Accademia Chigiana di Siena on scholarship to study chamber music with Yuri Bashmit, Katia Labeque, Tchaikovsky Prize winner Mario Brunello and Italian composer Luciano Berio, among others.

Both musicians, born in Italy and England respectively, are well-known players with international careers in Amsterdam's avant-garde music scene.

Orpheus Down

Orpheus Down by Irish composer Ian Wilson was written for them and has not yet been heard in the Netherlands. The work spans 50 minutes and describes in the abstract narrative of the sounds of both instruments the story of Orpheus going into the underworld to find his beloved Eurydice again. The titles of the movements are go from The Mourning Song, via At the Gates, Passing Ghosts to Towards the Light and Singing Forever. Wilson composed more than 200 works from solo to opera that have been performed in many different countries. His compositions have been published by leading publishers Ricordi and Universal Edition.