Teun Goudriaan

The Story of Dutch baroque music is a story of cultural connections, of European history. There was not a shortage of music, including repertoire for recorder, in Holland: Amsterdam was not only a center of composition and instrument making, but also one of the most important centers for music publishing. Many of the most esteemed Italian composers had their work published in Amsterdam, making it available there earlier there than in their own country. Dutch composers as well as musicians of the time were thus ironically more ‘close to the source’ than many of their Italian colleagues. The music that was written by Dutch composers was heavily influenced by the Italian style.

“Free Three” brings together three key musicians from the Belgian jazz scene. Serge Lazarevitch, Nicolas Thys and Teun Verbruggen share the same musical tastes and cross stylistic borders to explore the moving landscapes of jazz and improvisation.

Il giovane Teun Toebes, studente di infermieristica (al verde e dotato di una eccezionale curiosità), decide di trasferirsi in una casa di riposo e di sperimentare la vita quotidiana degli anziani residenti, non come infermiere o badante, ma come coinquilino. L’esperienza è destinata a cambiare la sua vita e quella dei suoi nuovi amici. Inizia così a organizzare aperitivi al venerdì e gite fuori porta, e reintroduce il piacere per le piccole cose: una risata, un ballo, una tazza di buon caffè, la possibilità di sedersi al sole. Man mano che si inserisce nella comunità, però, Teun si rende conto in modo sempre più preoccupante di come la società e il sistema di assistenza sminuiscano gli anziani e in particolare le persone affette da demenza, perciò decide di fare qualcosa al riguardo..

All these artists that have seemingly well-established cult fanbases… How do people discover them? Where do they hide out? It would seem that sextet The Bureau Of Atomic Tourism are ‘a considerable force in avant-garde jazz’, and while I’m not exactly 100% on the pulse when it comes to the genre, I do have numerous inroads into the musical milieu. But in a well-populated but spacious and divergent field, it’s perhaps not entirely shocking that The Bureau Of Atomic Tourism have slipped under my radar, especially considering the fact that their last long-player, Hapax Legomena, was four years ago.

The musicians of the Bureau of Atomic Tourism – aka BOAT – were assembled by Belgian drummer Teun Verbruggen for Antwerp's Follow the Sound Festival in November 2011. Several days after the festival gig, BOAT recorded their 2013 debut album, Second Law of Thermodynamics, at a club show in Tilburg, the Netherlands, and by then they were truly firing on all cylinders. Verbruggen (Flat Earth Society, Jef Neve Trio, Too Noisy Fish) certainly surrounded himself with a top international lineup: bassist Trevor Dunn, reedman Andrew D'Angelo, and trumpeter Nate Wooley from the Brooklyn avant scene in the U.S.; and guitarist Marc Ducret and (Belgian-born) keyboardist Jozef Dumoulin from France.

The new piano trio Too Noisy Fish has matured as the rhythm section of the Flat Earth Society Big Band. After improvised performances with guests like Ben Sluys and Ellery Eskelin, the trio now goes its own way.Peter Vandenberghe, already shadow composer of the Flat Earth Society, wrote the songs under the denominator of Fast, Easy or Sick. The ground-breaking compositions are shaped by the musical mastery of Kristof Roseeuw on bass and Teun Verbruggen on drums.