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More operas and classical concerts are offered in Dutch theatres and concert halls. More theatre was also offered for young people. Nice developments, but the increase in supply (3 per cent) did not directly lead to a proportionate increase in audiences. That increased by only 1 per cent. The number of spectators for theatre and cabaret even fell. Therefore.
Russian-Dutch Maya Fridman (Moscow, 1989) plays classical and contemporary music as well as rock, jazz, folk and flamenco. Communication with the audience is now her main aim. So why limit yourself to a particular style or genre? The Cello Biennale website rightly describes her as a 'musical jack-of-all-trades'. She scored highly in 2016 at this...
She is young, beautiful and well-spoken. Writer Silvia Avallone, known for her bestseller Staal, does not shy away from sensitive themes in her compelling new novel Levenslichtde either, such as the economic crisis, infertility and unevenly divided parenthood. 'Claiming freedom for yourself is something terrifying for an Italian woman.' Rough edges Poverty, economic malaise, gender inequality......
Say 'Carlo Gesualdo' and you say 'heavenly music', and 'cruel disposition'. This Renaissance composer's name is inextricably linked to the gruesome double murder he committed on his wife and lover when he found them in flagrante delicto. Who else but The Warm Shop could make an appealing performance of this thought Tido Visser, artistic director of the Netherlands Chamber Choir. So.
Thursday 17 May opens SPRING Performing Arts Festival in Utrecht with, among others, Sic Transit Gloria Mundi by Dries Verhoeven and to come (extended) by Mette Ingvartsen. Over ten days, over twenty-five international dance and theatre productions, installations and performance works will be on show in public spaces and urban environments. A week earlier, festival director Rainer Hofmann looks relaxed. 'Until now...
A flat and desolate landscape stretches on either side of the old road to Ferrara. Agricultural areas, created on the fertile soils of the Po delta, leave an impression of decay. Gradually, they flow into suburbs with a predominantly industrial character. Little indicates the approach of the Italian city designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Castello Estense...
In 1968, paving stones flew through the air in Paris. EYE Film Museum is packing big with the celebration of the 50th anniversary of that revolutionary year that unnerved and inspired filmmakers worldwide. But hadn't that wave of innovation started much earlier?
From one day to the next, writer Henk van Straten (38) broke up his marriage and moved into a tiny house. About his struggles with loneliness, single parenthood, booze, pills and a sex addiction, he wrote Messages from the halfway house: a witty and ruthlessly honest account of his early midlife crisis. Skateboarding veteran Your crisis began, at least according to your book, with a...
With her new novel, Esther Gerritsen takes a surprising path. De trooster is more serious in tone than we have come to expect from her in recent years. "In the past, I would not have dared to do this, write about religion and then also without it being very funny." Uncanny "Beautiful isn't it, the cover? Esther Gerritsen is delighted with the cover
Wolf is Kristien Hemmerechts' first novel since her non-fiction book about breast cancer, and it is about rage. What it's like to be furious, the Belgian writer knows all about that. "When I had breast cancer, I experienced intense feelings of aggression." Why is it that some people who have experienced trauma or tragedy can give it a place,...
Tomas Ross, also called the godfather of Dutch 'faction', concludes his trilogy on the Dutch East Indies with his new thriller Het verdriet van Wilhelmina. ,,Readers often say: with you, we never know what is true and what is false. You might find that an objection, but I think it's a compliment.'' Arnie Springer The new thriller by Tomas...
A hopeful experiment has begun in Finland. In the Netherlands, too, they are trying to get something off the ground, although the government is thwarting the plans for now. Why is unclear. Because even big-capitalists like Elon Musk (Tesla) and Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook) are now saying it: a Universal Basic Income (UBI) is the only way we can advance our society, and with it our civilisation...
The best performers are a few heads taller on stage than in real life. This also applies to Carmien Michels. I knew the writer, performer, slam poet and jack-of-all-trades in cultural life mostly from her legendary performances at the 2016 NK Poetry Slam and the Night of Poetry in September 2017. Radiance and presence, which...
This young writer from Hengelo - she turns 32 in January - sold over a quarter of a million copies of her debut novel This Is Where It Ends in the United States. It spent 64 weeks on The New York Times bestseller list. So Hengelo-based Young Adult writer Marieke Nijkamp did feel slight pressure while writing her second book, Before I...
The string quartet is considered Joseph Haydn's invention; Goethe considered it the nec plus ultra of instrumental music. 'One hears four intelligent people conversing with each other' said the poet. 'One believes to understand something of their conversation and to know the idiosyncrasies of the instruments.' We get plenty of that opportunity from 27 January to 3 February, during...
A Quattro Mani's pop-uprecent Afke Bohle takes up the challenge of reading a book with her sons. After good experiences with Suzie Ruzie and Susan van 't Hullenaar's The Green Hand series, she is now venturing into Tori, Brian Elstak's recent children's book in collaboration with author Karin Amatmoekrim, touted as: 'finally a book for all children'....
She has just flown in and has barely had time to eat lunch. So after the interview, Nigella Lawson (57) quickly fishes a sandwich out of a plastic bag from her bag. The successful British television chef has a killer schedule promoting her new cookbook, and there is no more than this between interviews. A...
How should you grieve? Is there any way to grieve, or are you at the mercy of fate? How do you deal with someone in grief? Grief therapist Julia Samuel has been helping people who have lost a loved one for 25 years. By now, she knows how to and, more importantly, how not to. In March this year, a few days before...
I Know a Secret is the twelfth thriller in the series surrounding detective Jane Rizzoli and pathologist-anatomist Maura Isles. Writer Tess Gerritsen reached an audience of millions with it, but longs for more. As the main characters of Tess Gerritsen's thrillers, detective Jane Rizzoli and pathologist Maura Isles have been through quite a bit by now. Yet they are startled by the state of their...
What would Italy be like a year after the earthquakes, we had wondered. What would be left of the centuries-old cultural heritage in this beautiful region on the border of Umbria, Marche and Lazio? Why do you never really hear about it in the news anymore? We ourselves, Vivian de Gier and Marc Brester, residents of just...
Rule of Three is a piece for three dancers: Steven Michel, Julien Josse and Courtney May Robertson. NAH makes the music live, the lighting is by Jan Fedinger and there are some lyrics by Lydia Davis. Rule of Three was released last month at De Singel in Antwerp, and its Dutch premiere is today at the Stadsschouwburg in Amsterdam....
On 11 September 1985, the biggest train disaster in Portuguese history took place. Near Alcafache, an international express train collided with a local barge. Nothing was ever recovered from dozens of passengers. They were totally charred in the scorching inferno. Portuguese writer João Ricardo Pedro, in his stunning novel Underway, reconstructs how one of those missing people ended up in that place where...
Good timing always remains tricky. Just as the middle class is getting ready for the Sinterklaas season, the Supervisory Board of Kunstencentrum Witte de With announces that the name is going to change. That name came up for discussion in the wave of public agitation over appropriation, unionist images and reparations for the Netherlands' slavery past. Initially, it seemed to...
When he was given a car to play with as a child, you wouldn't hear or see him all day. Because he does love people and likes to perform, but off-stage rapper Glenn de Randamie (32), aka Typhoon, prefers to be by himself. Then he has peace, humour and creativity for ten. 'The more alone I...
They have been around for 25 years but are buzzing as if they were founded yesterday. With the creation of a work of art at Eelde airport - to be followed live from today - as well as exhibitions at 25 locations in and around Groningen, the artists of the international artists' collective toyism are celebrating their anniversary. Self-willed, original and committed are perhaps the most important characteristics of this international collective....
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