Klankkast
Klankkast
Over the past few years, Stichting JIN in Nijmegen has given me the opportunity to curate a concert every six months, completely free to choose the musicians and music I wanted to explore at that particular moment. These concerts gradually became known as Klankkast: a space in which I could experiment without having to work towards a predetermined result.
During the past two years, I have increasingly used Klankkast to write and explore music that feels closer to me personally. It is not repertoire written specifically for Naamu, or for any other existing project. Instead, these are songs and compositions that can take different shapes depending on the musicians involved. Some have lyrics, others are instrumental; some can exist in several different line-ups. What connects them is an emphasis on strong melodies, space, and the story or emotion at the heart of the music.
This search for more personal music developed during a turbulent period surrounding my mother’s illness and, eventually, her passing. The vulnerability, frustration and conflicting emotions of that period inevitably found their way into the compositions and gradually became part of what Klankkast is about.
Musically, I have become increasingly interested in music that does not need to constantly demand attention. The work of Blake Mills has been an important inspiration in that respect: adventurous music in which silence and restraint leave room for the composition itself. I am less interested in predetermined structures, virtuosity for its own sake or a succession of solos. The song, its sound and its meaning should come first.
That is also why Klankkast has no fixed line-up. Previous editions have allowed me to explore the music with musicians including Jeroen van Vliet, Jesse Schilderink, Mete Erker, Mark Schilders, Wouter Kรผhne, Koen Smits and Joรซl Botma, alongside many other Dutch musicians whose sound and musical personality I find inspiring. Changing the musicians changes the music, and that has become an essential part of the process.
For the same reason, I do not want to record these compositions too early. Playing them live allows them to grow, breathe and reveal what they need before they are documented permanently. The concerts are therefore not primarily a way of presenting finished material, but part of the process of shaping it.
By now, around twenty-five pieces have emerged. At some point, I intend to select the compositions that feel most essential and personal to me and record them slowly, carefully and without unnecessary time pressure, as an ode to my mother. Whether that recording appears in 2027, 2028 or later is deliberately left open.
Until then, Klankkast will occasionally appear in concert in different formations. The line-up may change from one performance to another, but the underlying idea remains the same: intimate, spacious music in which the composition, its sound and its message take precedence.
