Music is best enjoyed live, and where better to do that than on a train? Especially a train travelling along one of the most beautiful routes in the Netherlands: the IJssel Valley between Arnhem and Zwolle. Views of farmland gliding by, rather than the distribution centres and data centres you come across elsewhere. And then suddenly, right next to you, an exceptionally friendly young woman starts stamping her feet and playing the violin at full volume.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For the uninitiated passenger, it came as quite a surprise to be greeted in a train compartment by the award-winning violinist Martine Velthuis, who was stamping her feet as she performed the piece Dance<\/em> by Theo Loevendie. The other end of the carriage was occupied by the Ardemus Quartet, consisting of four saxophonists whose music perfectly complemented the languid rhythm of the train journey between Zutphen and Deventer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Last Saturday marked the fifth Composer\u2019s Day, and for the first time there were also live concerts to enjoy on regular trains. Unfortunately, this was only on one route so far, as it would be really lovely to fill those often wasted minutes on public transport with real, live music in many more places. To feel the air vibrating together in the same space \u2013 or the floor, when Martine Velthuis joins in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Or, if you do find yourself craving a bit more peace and quiet in the carriage: a concert in the station concourse, like the one that morning in Arnhem, where wind players walked from all corners of the organic-style building towards a central performance area. It takes you out of your daily grind \u2013 provided, that is, you haven\u2019t set the noise-cancelling on your own earphones a bit too high. Listening to live music together: that\u2019s what you do at Pinkpop, but it\u2019s also possible at Arnhem or Zwolle station.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Composer\u2019s Day is all about the people in the Netherlands who write new music for ensembles and soloists playing all the instruments developed over the past millennia. New music that is not (yet) pop music, but which does influence it, as visitors to The Cure\u2019s gig at Pinkpop were able to experience. Music that sometimes has a reputation for being complex and difficult to listen to, but often sounds surprisingly human. And it is precisely that humanity that you miss more and more often, now that you can no longer tell the difference between \u2018real\u2019 and AI-generated music coming from the streamers in your ears, because everything has now been smoothed out by algorithms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It is precisely the train conductors, who joined the musicians halfway between Dieren and Zutphen, who make you feel it: something genuine is happening here, whether you can sing along straight away or not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So, more trains with live music next year. We\u2019ve got plenty of musicians and composers to make that happen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Muziek is het beste live te genieten, en waar doe je dat beter dan in de trein. En dan vooral de trein die rijdt over een van de mooiste trajeten van Nederland: de IJsselvallei tussen Arnhem en Zwolle. Uitzicht op langsglijdende landerijen in plaats van de distributie- en datacenters die je elders tegenkomt. En dat […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_eb_attr":"","_themeisle_gutenberg_block_has_review":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":3,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"federated","wpai_meta_description":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4760,8843,11687],"tags":[16545,16565,58],"class_list":["post-120795","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-muziek-podiumkunst-2","category-podiumkunst","category-donatie-gevraagd","tag-dag-van-de-componist","tag-ns","tag-recensie"],"views":3734,"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":116738,"url":"https:\/\/cultureelpersbureau.nl\/en\/2026\/06\/dag-van-de-componist-2026-gaat-van-start-met-muziek-in-de-gewone-ns-trein\/","url_meta":{"origin":120795,"position":0},"title":"Day of the Composer 2026 kicks off with music on \u2018regular\u2019 NS train","author":"New Music Now","date":"8 June 2026","format":false,"excerpt":"Day of the Composer 2026 kicks off with music in the \u2018regular\u2019 NS train, nine City Composers and City Songs at stations as the start of music routes in numerous cities on Saturday 20 June 2026. 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Not slippery<\/h2>\n\n\n\n