Anything for which people enter a stage.
Last year, a minor riot erupted when the Holland Festival announced it was mounting a large-scale project in 2019 around Karlheinz Stockhausen's opera Light. Modern-music haters screamed blue murder, because who is waiting for the German wordsmith's nasty squeak? Yet a run on the charts immediately ensued. Even after his death...
One of the highlights of the year is always the presentation of 'the figures' by the Association of Theatre and Concert Hall Directors (VSCD). As it happens, these are unabatedly positive. For years. And so for years it has been a challenge to find out why those positive figures are so difficult to reconcile with the picture of reality. That not at all...
Since 2012, Yoram Ish-Hurwitz has organised the Oranjewoud Festival in Friesland every summer. In doing so, the equally enterprising and adventurous pianist makes nature an inseparable part of the musical experience. From Wednesday 1 to Monday 5 June, he once again surprises his audience with concerts at special locations. Spread across the area, over 120 top Dutch and international musicians will play the most beautiful...
The wind blows harder there than elsewhere. The light is greyer there than further afield. London's south bank, for years 'the other side' of the English capital's posh city centre, has been the subject of several waves of renewal in the last century. It began in 1951 with the construction of concert hall 'Southbank Centre', followed in 1976, after years of wrangling, by the building in the same...
Each month, in the (Un)heard series, I present extraordinary sounds that do not go unnoticed and unsung. In this episode: Plan Kruutntoone, Horse Lords, Luc Ferrari, Anemone Tube, Jaap Vink and Kraftwerk in 3D. Plan Kruutntoone - What Do the Hands (LP on esc.rec.) "woke up again. xenakis is nothing like it. shoving myself and stuff in search of safety. how...
We are real Holland Festival specialists by now. We go and see performances beforehand, interview makers, actors and walk around the halls, in the foyers, just about every day. We hear a lot, we see a lot and we share it here. Cultural journalism as it should be, in short. Cultural journalism that should also be there. And it totally succeeds if you take out a subscription. Then you get...
What does it mean for a dancer with an intense career when she decides to choreograph as well? In March, Battle Abbey premiered, Heather Ware's first full-length choreography in collaboration with Swedish cellist Jakob Korányi. Heather Ware, a dancer with LeineRoebana since 2003, embarked on the path to creating her own choreography without a plan....
Using a television interview as a libretto for an opera? Quirky composer Huba de Graaff does not shy away from it. On 22 June, her opera The Naked Shit Songs will have its world premiere. It is based on a 1996 conversation by Theo van Gogh with British artist duo Gilbert & George. Due to lack of interest, De Graaff wanted her opera with a...
A fearsome roar announces the emergence of action-hero Chuck. And there really is no one who can come on so cool in a cart, half all-terrain vehicle and half golf cart, as Ko van de Bosch. With his too-long, too-grey hair in a ponytail and too-brown body in a black-leather motorbike suit, he immediately epitomises youth at...
Netflix and HBO are now purveyors of our conversations with friends, family and colleagues. The ultimate icebreaker at a party with strangers is talking about series, about beloved characters. Is Jon Snow still alive? Where is Barb? Having seen the first two working performances of 'The Nation', I have a strong impression that in Eric de Vroedt I have a fellow lover...
'Stop it. The fewer awards people give each other, the better.' Ingmar Heytze, poet, is clear: 'Within every conceivable genre, there are already big enough prizes. If you ask me, they should restrict that Nobel Prize to science from now on.' So on the final evening of the International Literature Festival in Utrecht (ILFU) next Saturday, it will be all about those...
Friday 12 May kicks off the twelfth edition of Operadagen Rotterdam. Titled Lost & Found, the ten-day festival is dedicated to current refugee issues. I selected three operas by Calliope Tsoupaki, Annelies van Parys and Claron McFadden, strong women whose work deserves to be heard (and seen). The fear of the unknown is as old as the...
In the Volkskrant of 8 May 2017, Sarah Sluimer lets loose. The opinion maker (for Volkskrant and De Correspondent, among others) used to be a theatre maker and now wonders aloud why she is a bit done with theatre. Because she actually writes that down. I quote: 'I breathed theatre. I ate performances and was convinced that what was there,...
The play La Democrazia in America (to be seen at the Holland Festival on 4, 5 and 6 June) is of course about democracy in America, but actually more about The Democracy in America. And the two should not be confused. For The Democracy in America is a 1,200-page book by French jurist De Tocqueville. This...
It is dark. Basses thump. An intoxicatingly sweet female perfume hangs in the air, a child cries. AquaSonic has just started, and I already want to leave. What possesses a musician to go head-to-head? Our Danish correspondent went to find out. AquaSonic is an ode to water, played by Between Music, a collective of five Danish musicians. They make...
Vincent Macaigne is uncomfortable. He looks around nervously every time the waitresses run past with trays full of clinking glasses and slam the doors. He has barely slept, and the previous evening he had walloped the audience of the Swiss Theatre Vidy with his brutal, inimitable performance En Manque. Braced, he sat down for the interview. "Sorry, I...
For new music, the primal performance is often also immediately the last time a piece is played. The scores await the archive or dusty drawer; recordings are nowhere to be found. David Dramm searches for these gems of stilted notes. He presents them at the Holland Festival Orphanage: three evenings of forgotten compositions from the rich...
Wondrous story: Utrecht had a famous jazz club between 1957 and 1967. It was founded - including egg cartons on the vault - by jazz-loving teenagers. Not only the fine fleur of Dutch jazz performed there, but also many an international big name. As part of Utrecht's Cultural Sundays, last Sunday (23 April), a wharf cellar on the...
Arnold Schoenberg (1874-1951) is often accused of driving audiences out of the hall with his drive for innovation. After all, his twelve-tone system swept away the foundations of tonality, which had provided listeners with a safe haven for centuries. Deprived of its foothold, it would have turned its back on contemporary music forever. Nonsense, because not only did Schoenberg write fantastic works, but also...
In Poland, her name appears on street signs and school buildings, and statues of her can be found in public parks. Grażyna Bacewicz (1909-1969) was the first Polish woman to achieve international success as a composer. Her work can even be found on one of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra's CD anthologies. Yet she is still virtually unknown here in the country. Unjustly so, as she wrote...
On Tuesday 12 April 2017, Finnish pioneer of avant-garde electronic music Mika Vainio passed away. He was 53 years old. According to Finnish media, Vainio died in an accident while on holiday in France. Shock Mika Vainio is considered a shining example and inspiration. Many artists from the electronic music world are therefore stunned and reacted on social media in disbelief....
In this period before Easter, Johann Sebastian Bach's Passions seem almost inescapable. But the alternatives are on the rise. Last week, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra and the Groot Omroepkoor presented two highly successful new Passions. Alternative passion Tomorrow bring the AVROTROS Friday Concert Deus Passus by German composer Wolfgang Rihm. It will be performed by the Groot Omroepkoor and the Radio Philharmonic ...
A tip for Good Friday. Viola player Saskia Meijs first made the necessary mileage in the 'classical' classical music world. She decided to leave it and look for a less formal and convention-laden career. Solo and with her group the Barockpuppies, she now undertakes the nicest things, at beautiful locations such as Frankendael and the Concertgemaal. Blessed...
German guitarist Heike Matthiesen (1969) was brought up on music. She was taken to the opera from an early age and from the age of four was taught piano by her mother, a concert pianist. It wasn't until she was eighteen that she decided to study guitar. She proved to be a natural talent and became one of the master students of renowned Spanish guitarist Pepe Romero. Al...
Displaced paintings by Armando. Artists fleeing the city. A tinpot that brought financial disaster and summer festivals that attract tens of thousands of visitors every year. And you thought Amersfoort was boring? A footnote along the A1 motorway? Forget it. Let me tell you about this city struggling with its cultural identity. A story in eighteen impressions. Guilty landscape In his youth...
Payments are made via iDeal, Paypal, Credit Card, Bancontact or Direct Debit. If you prefer to pay manually, based on an invoice in advance, we charge a 10€ administration fee
*Only for annual membership or after 12 monthly payments
English (UK) 
Nederlands 
Français
You must be logged in to post a comment.