Things that went, things that keep coming... | Willem Wander van Nieuwkerk

In the year this website is in existence, I made quite some music, but much more is to come…

In March 2006 I started this website. Some things that where very important to me have happened since then:

The first performances and first edition of the Three Dance Capriccios.

Writing and recording of the music for Ellen Blom’s movie The Birdwatcher (clips from that soundtrack will appear on this site soon).

The Brisk party in the Muziekgebouw at the IJ, my birthday present Catch, their recording of part of my Quartet on the cd Vintage Brisk.
Below you see how festively some composers dress up these days (here: in the disguise of a gift of flowers) to offer their work to performers (mind the score that I press tightly to my body). (Some of my other colleagues came in bags and boxes, or dressed up as a butler.)

This was followed immediately by the release of the cd Dutch Composers ‘Di Voce’ Part II that features my The Lamb & The Tyger by Womans Choir ‘Orpheus’ (see picture). The cd was solemnly presented to me at a concert in the beautiful castle of Doorwerth .

But these were only minor disturbances in that great undercurrent: composing ‘Over the Water’, the music for guitar and string quartet commissioned by Tom Kerstens and the International Guitar Festival. More about this later, but this work proved so demanding that I had to postpone for a while that other project, the sonata for cello and piano.

Translating my articles for this website into English proved far to time consuming – music goes way before text…

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.