On Sunday 10 September, Podium Klassiek opened the season in a very stripped-down version. Floris Kortie was all alone. In the world of public broadcasting and classical music, where things are usually fixed three years in advance, something was up. I felt an end approaching. Podium Witteman had become a fixture here at home....
Adriaan van Dis with an intensely coquettish Renate Dorrestein, who (rightly) got him on the ropes with a few well-aimed pussy remarks. This excerpt from 1991 opened Zomergasten 2023 #4, and it chopped. Nostalgia all around, and during those first minutes of Theo Maassen with animal and children's book author Bibi Dumon Tak, the bar was set high. Would Theo Maassen with this...
We are approaching episode 200 of Pearl Radio, a series of audio material that matters. Face of the cultural podcast is independent radio maker Stefanie Visjager. Delving into listening archives, interviewing creators and carrying the audience along in calm storytelling voice are all part of her remit. Since the birth of the term podcast in a 2004 Guardian article, it has been running wild...
What does culture visit after corona look like? The topic came up regularly on this site in recent months. I myself wrote two personal contributions on it. Now that cultural institutions may almost reopen their doors, the crystal ball is giving way to reality. In my article on 'the promise of the empty hall', I noted a reluctance to...
Many avid readers will dream of their favourite author sitting at their table one day, talking about her work. Perhaps just as many avid readers will take their dream author on a stroll, want to drink lamb on a café terrace or take them to a darkroom. Or to a classical concert at the Concertgebouw. All can be done. Some will even just...
We asked him a few questions about his experiences and influences. What is your experience with animation so far? Stephane Kaas, self-portrait 'As a child, I liked drawing comics. With a friend, I made the comic Kaas-Trek, a kind of persiflage on Star-Trek, and we would sell it to classmates and buy candy from them. Who framed Roger Rabbit remember...
Maybe it's the snow, and my little dog that made me so happy. Maybe it's the sledding children in 'The Pit' of Lunetten, and maybe it's the lameness that creeps up on me after so many valiant attempts to keep up the fun of art in times of Corona. But I sat through the first minutes of VPRO's Onstage...
No making shows for a while as if nothing happened, but developing concepts, experimenting, boldly going where no one in this sector has dared to go so far (sorry, I watch a lot of Star Trek during the lockdown). That strikes me as an excellent use of grant money and could also bring back some momentum in these crappy times.
People will not be eager (in large numbers) to go to packed halls again. Many 'old' culture visitors can be considered lost. The cultural sector faces a twofold challenge: to minimise this loss and to look for new audiences even more than usual.
With these five tips, we are sure to come up with a wonderful programme, in this bizarre summer we are facing, in which we will hopefully be allowed to hit the streets again at all. My fingers are crossed for both.
My tip to the bonzes in Het Gooi: forget young people. Focus on the wandering forties and fifties, who yearn for disruption. This broadcast of VPRO's Mondo was unforgettable.
From over 100 entries, 24 young composers have been selected for the semi-finals of the Netherlands Wind Ensemble's (NBE) composition competition Towards the New Year Concert with the grand prize of a performance with the NBE at the New Year Concert on 1 January (19:00 NPO 2).
The Dutch Wind Ensemble's (NBE) traditional New Year's concert at The Concertgebouw on Friday 1 January 2021 is going to look completely different from all previous editions. Because it is currently unclear whether, or how many, visitors The Concertgebouw is allowed to admit because of RIVM measures, the difficult decision has been taken to play the New Year's concert entirely without an audience.
In her programme Night Animals, Ryanne van Dorst again goes in search of night owls, night workers and other insomniacs. It is a fascinating and beautiful TV programme, and Van Dorst seems to have a patent on extraordinary encounters.
Golden Calf winner Buladó is now our Oscar entry. That will satisfy advocates of more colour in Dutch cinema. And on Sunday, check out Festus Toll's When You Hear the Divine Call, a more modest but equally telling example of new light in Dutch cinema.
I have long put myself on the 'listen first, talk later' mode when it came to how we all deal with the festering sore of racism in the Netherlands. There's so much we don't know about each other, and there's especially so much I can't know about my fellow Black people, because for a long time I felt too little...
In Verstoten Vaders, Elena Lindemans impressively highlights a huge, tucked-away social problem: of many tens of thousands of children who have to let go of one of their parents after a divorce. Elena: 'While making 'Wife Beats Husband' - a film about men who are victims of domestic violence - I came into contact with fathers who are abandoning their children - almost...
When I tried to explain to secondary school students the other day how little the orchestra members who perform the musical surprise act at the Eurovision Song Contest were paid, they looked at me in bewilderment. After all, it was more than you earn as a 16-year-old as a stock boy at the average grocery store. So what was really the problem? So now let's do some other maths, thanks to the...
Fascinating front-page news and headliners for all talk shows: Matthijs van Nieuwkerk quits DWDD after 15 years. Obviously a disaster of national proportions. The book industry proclaims the end of the world, bands can no longer break through, and the successor to De Correspondent can never again meet its crowdfunding target in six minutes. An institution disappears, and everyone panics. Who...
Those who want to be musicians have to bleed. Earlier, we reported that the highlight of the Dutch edition of the Eurovision Song Contest was going to be performed by professional musicians and conservatoire students who would receive 100 euros a day for it. Outrageously little, when you know that full days of work were going to be involved anyway, for eight days. Well: it's even worse than...
Where is the Metropole Orchestra? A unique orchestra, the only one in the world that can pull off the complete repertoire from classical to pop and jazz? The orchestra that used to accompany the Dutch acts at the Song Festival when everything was still live? The orchestra, which as recently as December was on tour with our new Song Contest candidate,...
[update: they get even less, see post below] We received confusing news last weekend. The occasion was the festive announcement by the organisers of the Eurovision Song Contest that a special symphonic happening would take place at the final in Rotterdam. Invited were third-year and master students from Rotterdam Conservatoire, part of Codarts, as well as young professional musicians. For the performances...
In the first version of this post, we assumed 100 euros for 8 days. We turned out to be misinformed. The application of the remplaçants' collective agreement, mentioned in the explanation by the Song Festival, gives a bit more leeway, although its hourly and daily rates are still controversial. But 1,000 euros for eight days is now apparently the going rate....
I described here earlier that Dutch animation film is on the rise. And as I look around the animation festival in Annecy, France, this week, it seems nice to see how our animation filmmakers and producers are presenting themselves here. Especially since Annecy is considered the most important event worldwide in this sector. 'The Cannes of animation' I hear...
The dance film occupies a unique place among the film offerings. Not driven purely by psychologising or text, it offers every opportunity for experimentation in form and content. But that also means it is difficult to place. And therefore difficult to make. The second part on the growing pains of the dance film features 2 dancers and performance artist....
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