He is not here | Willem Wander van Nieuwkerk

2016b

Piano solo

4'25

For Marcel Worms

The film The Blues Brothers contains a scene in which James Brown (alias the reverend Cleophus James) in a red preacher’s robe, stirs up a congregation of African-american believers until they, wildly dancing and singing in choir, glorify in a frenzie the Coming of the Lord. The two white Blues Brothers look on, perplexed by this eruption of musical zeal. Not cool, you may hear them thinking. But it’s sure as hell flippin’ amazing.
Whenever European religious music gives voice to the Gospel (the New Testament’s ‘Good News’), one does not experience such a funky urge to move. The Body of Our Lord suffers, or it is dead. Dancing does not play a role. As Beethoven said (quoting a Buddhist text): ‘Was frey ist von aller Lust und Begier, das ist der Mächtige.’ Still, the very quest for His Body has yielded the beautiful Gregorian melodies of the medieval passion plays and with them, the first European theatre.
That is why I took as the main melody in this piece a ‘Quem quaeritis in sepulchro’ (Whom do you seek in the grave) from St. Gallen that I vary stylistically and put alongside a paraphrase of the Blues March (written by trumpettist Benny Golson for Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers). Invited by the musical key, I also could not resist a (slightly amended) reference to Beethoven’s highly physical op. 106 (für das Hammer Clavier), whose jubilant tone answers another reference (also slightly amended) to the Victimae paschali laudes.

In fact, none of the thematic material in this piece is my own, so, as an author, I am surely ‘not here’.
For what is true for European is true for Afro-American music: to quote is to pay homage.

The piece has been recorded by Marcel Worms at Zefir Records.

About me

Musical beauty and simplicity are my aim. My guiding principle is the classical European tradition. Folk music, church music and Early Music are the sources to which I return to seek new melodic beauty. I value musical craftsmanship and intuition highly. Musicians are my first audience. It is their virtuosic interplay, comic or dramatic, but always emotionally charged, that is the musical theater my music presents to the listener. The sounds I cherish most are those that through the musician’s hearts, breath and hands bear the mark of their personal interpretation.
Chamber music is, therefore, central to me – I have written for the Bennewitz Quartet and Harry-Imre Dijkstra, the Skampa Quartet, Rosanne Philippens, the Bartók Trio, the Utrecht String Quartet and many others.
My chamber music for recorders has a special place in my work and is played in large numbers by amateurs. The CD Kadanza is a fruit of decades of collaboration with the best professionals who were often also the best teachers.
For me, choral music is also a species of chamber music. It should challenge and offer musical satisfaction to those many amateur singers – that I am one of.

My music features individual performers – to convey a thought, an emotion, and a story to the audience in a virtuoso and intense fashion.

In rehearsal and performance, the performers and I learn a lot from each other. Sometimes their improvisations are included in the musical story. Scores will always be adapted to their needs.

The interplay between performer and composer is absolutely essential in newly written music. As is the interplay between sponsor and composer.

Would you like me to rehearse with you or do you want to know more about a piece?

Do you want me to write a piece for a particular line-up or event?

Please let me know and I will contact you.

Besides composing, I lecture in New Music at the Conservatorium van Amsterdam, with a focus on chamber music and music aesthetics. Some of the writing and thinking that I do there can be found in the ‘text’ section.