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Louis Andriessen

Images from ReichRichter - photographer Raf Keunen

[press release] Asko|Schönberg opens the Minimal Music Festival with the Dutch premiere of Reich/Richter. NB extra concert due to great interest.

Reich/Richter - 12 April Amsterdam Minimal Music Festival Also in the Minimal Music Festival: Mapping Andriessen - 13 April, by Asko|Schönberg and Ensemble Klang Reich/Richter Two of the greatest living artists in their own disciplines join forces: Steve Reich, founder of minimal music, and Gerhard Richter, who is among the top post-war visual artists. Together, they stand... 

Read More "[press release] Asko|Schönberg opens the Minimal Music Festival with the Dutch premiere of Reich/Richter. NB extra concert due to great interest.

HOLLAND FESTIVAL 2020 CONNECTS CREATORS AND AUDIENCES IN FRAGMENTED TIMES

The Holland Festival 2020 had an exceptional year; due to the corona pandemic, it did not physically go ahead for the first time in its history. Instead, it was given an online programme as its fulfilment. Holland Festival online programme 2.0-2.0 was the 73rd edition of the festival and the second to work with an associate artist. This year, that was choreographer, director,... 

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That's why concert halls need to reopen as soon as possible. By any means necessary.

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... 

Read More "That's why concert halls need to reopen as soon as possible. By any means necessary.

HOLLAND FESTIVAL ONLINE PROGRAMME 2.0-2.0

From 11 to 21 June, the Holland Festival will present an online programme as close as possible to the core and essence of the original programme, which was cancelled due to the corona crisis. Together with artists from around the world who were due to perform in the 2020 festival, an alternative online programme has been put together. The festival theme, suggested by... 

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HOLLAND FESTIVAL 2020 WITH BILL T. JONES IN SEARCH OF A 'WE'

From 4 to 28 June 2020, Amsterdam will host the 73rd edition of the Holland Festival. Associate Artist this year is American choreographer, director, writer and dancer Bill T. Jones. His work will include the new show Deep Blue Sea, in which Jones himself dances and, assisted by a hundred mostly local... 

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A great 2020 with the Holland Festival, vacancies and aus LICHT Opera of the Year

The Holland Festival wishes you a happy 2020! The full programme of the 73rd festival edition will be announced on 11 February. You can already order tickets for the five productions below. Also in this newsletter: vacancies for a head of operations/controller, an employee development and interns for the communication & marketing and production departments; and aus LICHT named Opera of the Year 2019.... 

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Musicians in plastic and a rock-hard snare drum - Forty years of orchestra de ereprijs celebrated with 4 new compositions - one for each decade

As an intro, the percussionist of orchestra the prize of honour played a cadenza of air beats. When he unexpectedly gave a cutting blow on his snare drum, everyone was startled. Thus, with Bewegung ohne Bewegung for cello and ensemble by Jan van de Putte, opened the anniversary concert of the ensemble founded in 1979 by Wim Boerman. Last year,... 

Read More "Musicians in plastic and a rock-hard snare drum - Forty years of orchestra de ereprijs celebrated with 4 new compositions - one for each decade

'I hope we will all slip into another world.' Calliope Tsoupaki writes Bosch Requiem 'Liknon' for November Music

In 1988, Calliope Tsoupaki (1963) came to the Netherlands from Greece to study composition with Louis Andriessen. Exactly 30 years later, she was appointed 'Composer of the Fatherland'. In that capacity, she has already composed some highly topical pieces. When Notre Dame de Paris caught fire on 15 April, Tsoupaki immediately climbed into the pen. Five days later... 

Read More "'I hope we will all slip into another world.' Calliope Tsoupaki writes Bosch Requiem 'Liknon' for November Music

Composer Marijn Simons: 'Everything is about timing'

Although the press picks it up only sparsely, not only the NTRZaterdagMatinee pays much attention to Dutch composers. Indeed, they are also well represented in the AVROTROS Vrijdagconcert (formerly De Vrijdag van Vredenburg). In 2014, for instance, Joey Roukens wrote The building of the temple to mark the reopening of TivoliVredenburg. Two years later, the season opened with Atlantis by Robin... 

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A fertile repertoire landscape.

Performing arts policy greatly determines what can be seen and heard on Dutch stages. It underpins government funding of theatre and music. This policy pays a lot of attention to the quality of performances, but it hardly discusses the choice of pieces played, let alone what kind of repertoire landscape... 

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Cellist Maya Fridman: 'The best thing about making music is communicating with my audience.'

Cellist Maya Fridman was born in Moscow in 1989, where she emerged as a child prodigy. Even while still studying at Schnittke College, she won first prize at the International Festival of Slavic Music. In 2010, she came to the Netherlands, where six years later she graduated Cum Laude from the Conservatorium van Amsterdam. Fridman naturally places contemporary... 

Read More "Cellist Maya Fridman: 'The best thing about making music is communicating with my audience.'

City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra plays Fires by Raminta Šerkšnytė

The City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra is coming to our country. On Monday 9 April, they will give a concert in TivoliVredenburg Utrecht under their young chief conductor Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla. They will play music by Wagner, Debussy and Beethoven, a fairly standard programme at first sight. But fortunately, Lithuanian Gražinytė-Tyla brings a piece by her compatriot Raminta Šerkšnytė. Who wrote Fires... 

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Season 2018-19: Concertgebouw picks up women's hand that Concertgebouw Orchestra leaves behind

Joel Fried, artistic director of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra visibly startled for a moment. I asked him if there is really only one female composer scheduled in the 2018-19 season. Indeed, during the presentation on Monday 26 February at the Concertgebouw, I only heard the name of Lotta Wennäkoski. Indeed the Finn appears to be the only one to defend the honour of composing women.... 

Read More "Season 2018-19: Concertgebouw picks up women's hand that Concertgebouw Orchestra leaves behind

Dobrinka Tabakova writes double concerto for Lucas and Arthur Jussen: 'It shimmers with energy'

The AVROTROS Friday Concert cherishes mainstream masterpieces as well as less heard and new repertoire. In the 2017-18 season, no fewer than five (world) premieres are on the programme, three of them composed by a woman. - Come and see that among the national orchestras. Friday 17 November will hear the brand new double concert Together Remember to Dance by British/Bulgarian Dobrinka Tabakova. She composed it on... 

Read More "Dobrinka Tabakova writes double concerto for Lucas and Arthur Jussen: 'It shimmers with energy'

Holland Festival blames itself with Orphanage of Music #HF17

The Orphanage of Dutch Music presents monthly 'forgotten Dutch masterpieces' at Amsterdam's Splendor stage. 'To discover the finer points', these are performed twice, interrupted by 'a short commentary or interview with special table guests'. On paper, a golden formula. Rightly so, the Holland Festival adopted three episodes. With the music, during the opening concert on Thursday, it was all in... 

Read More "Holland Festival blames itself with Orphanage of Music #HF17

Order, peace and disorder in the Orphanage #HF17

Roaring programmers announce new compositions: "World premiere!" jubilate the posters. Superb, but in contemporary music practice, that primal performance is often immediately the last. The score goes into an archive folder. The notes fall silent; the roar falls silent. The Orphanage takes care of those forgotten works. Context David Dramm snatches such pieces from oblivion and presents them with context at the Orphanage 

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Why we're losing more and more music thanks to 'digital' #HF17

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... 

Read More "Why we're losing more and more music thanks to 'digital' #HF17

Andriessen's The Matter opens World Minimal Music Festival

Wednesday 5 April kicks off the fifth edition of the biennial World Minimal Music Festival. For five days, the Muziekgebouw aan 't IJ will be filled with hypnotic rhythms, trance-inducing melodies and conjuring drones. Alongside well-known works by pioneers such as La Monte Young and Terry Riley are new compositions by Kate Moore and Bryce Dessner. There will also be performances by the Master... 

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Finds inside (Misha Mengelberg 1935 - 2017)

There is sound; a notion of impotence; a programme without a head or tail; there is power, chatter, compassion; there is nothing but also a vista, blurred image full of action and opposition. Moreover, the language seems a bit overwrought here and there. Of course, incoherent drivel can be cosy, or moving. Under circumstances, meaningfulness may be possible, but it will not... 

Read More "Finds inside (Misha Mengelberg 1935 - 2017)

Han de Vries: delving through four centuries of oboe music

It will happen to you. At 70, they honour you with a CD box set, five years later you are offered a compilation twice the size. It happened to Dutch oboist Han de Vries (The Hague, 1941), who celebrated his 75th birthday last August. In 2011, his former student Peter Bree collected the radio recordings on nine CDs, this time he filled a... 

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What I learned from Jan Wolff, the late director of Muziekgebouw aan 't IJ

During the big January cleaning in my private museum, I rediscovered the book released in 2007, on the occasion of the Music Building on the IJ, which opened two years earlier. I had forgotten that it came with a CD with four pieces on it. The fourth piece is a recording of the opening speech given by Jan Wolff [hints]former director IJsbreker, more than twenty... 

Read More "What I learned from Jan Wolff, the late director of Muziekgebouw aan 't IJ
Gerrit Rietveld's Red and Blue Chair in original and later condition (source: commons.wikimedia.org)

The Rietveld chair was brown - 10 things you didn't know about De Stijl #MTDD

Something with straight lines and planes and primary colours. We all get that far with De Stijl. But did you know that there was also Style music and that a mechanical figure danced to that, er, Style? Let's get things straight before the Mondrian to Dutch Design exhibition season begins. 1. Mondrian was not the big man of De Stijl Piet... 

Read More "The Rietveld chair was brown - 10 things you didn't know about De Stijl #MTDD

'Quite an uproar': a century of contempt for the arts

In 1975, jazz musician Misha Mengelberg and artist Wim T. Schippers organised Een behoorlijk kabaal (Quite a racket) at Amsterdam's Mickery Theatre. For a week, they explore the different meanings of a concert in 'inimitable musical theatre'. Jacqueline Oskamp chose it as the title of her recently published book describing Dutch music history of the past century. Sad conclusion: there is... 

Read More "'Quite an uproar': a century of contempt for the arts

Congratulations to Daniel Reuss on royal honour!

On Tuesday 2 November, Cappella Amsterdam presented a new CD at the Orgelpark. This includes Arvo Pärt's large-scale choral work Kanon Pokajanen, which was also performed live. After the concert, chief conductor Daniel Reuss was appointed Knight of the Order of the Dutch Lion. This very high royal decoration is only awarded to people "with extraordinary merits... 

Read More "Congratulations to Daniel Reuss on royal honour!

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