Evensong Eric Vloeimans the Netherlands Symphony Orchestra Jurjen Hempel

evensong ERIC VLOEIMANS The Netherlands Symphony Orchestra Jurjen Hempel 1 evensong ERIC VLOEIMANS trumpet The Netherlands Symphony Orchestra Jurjen Hempel conductor Hans Vroomans piano Jeroen Vierdag double bass Dirk-Peter Kölsch drums ERIC VLOEIMANS (b. 1963) & MARTIN FONDSE (b. 1967) Was there anything left to be added admires, Martin Fondse. A piece, Evensong (2011) to the score, could trumpeter Eric magnificently performed by the [1] Movement 1 11:17 Vloeimans (Huizen, 1963) still tick Netherlands Symphony Orchestra, [2] Movement 2 3:48 off another musical goal anywhere? that we can regard without hesitation [3] Movement 3 7:47 Hadn’t he achieved everything he as a new monument in the trumpeter’s [4] Movement 4 2:08 could during an almost incredible already huge and unfettered oeuvre. career in Dutch and international ERIC VLOEIMANS jazz, a life in music that had already For how numerous are the guises in [5] Lex (2011) (arr. Martin Fondse) 4:59 brought him armfuls of awards, which we encountered Eric Vloeimans including – to mention just a few – in the past decades? That of inspired MARTIN FONDSE a North Sea Jazz Bird Award, and leader of the ‘chamber jazz trio’ Waterfront (2008) the prestigious Boy Edgar Prize? Fugimundi, with which Vloeimans [6] Introduction 3:50 provides jazz for the intimacy of the [7] Movement 1 4:09 Let’s picture Vloeimans for a moment, living room. That of frenzied trumpeter [8] Movement 2 3:44 struggling with the aforementioned in the electric band Gatecrash, a combo [9] Movement 3 2:20 questions, a faraway look in his eyes. that seeks the excitement and dynamics [10] Final 4:01 Yes, there was still a glimmer on the of the jazz as well as pop venues. horizon, something grand, majestic ERIC VLOEIMANS and intangible, a musical piece as In the concert halls, we’ve seen [11] Requiem (2000) (arr. Martin Fondse) 6:01 proof of mastery. And now, on this Vloeimans with the Arnhem Philhar- [12] Your Majesty (2010) (arr. Bernard Hunnekink) 7:14 cd, we can immerse ourselves in the monic Orchestra and the Limburg result of these musings: his very own Symphony Orchestra, or playing with total time 61:48 trumpet concerto, entitled Evensong, the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra. which Vloeimans wrote with the He performed with ensembles such composer, arranger and pianist he as the Calefax Reed Quintet and 4 5 the Holland Baroque Society. And distant frontiers. His sound has been Henri Broeren. Of course, the brass theme slowly takes shape, Vloeimans has written film scores: compared to that of a woodwind trumpeter had long ceased to be and unfolds itself in orchestral music for Majesteit from 2010, of which the player: in Vloeimans we sometimes a stranger to composition, but with grand gestures. piece Your Majesty, ultimately unused hear the exoticism of the Persian flute. the orchestration was something in the film, can now be discovered on We can also hear Vloeimans flex his Vloeimans could sink his teeth into. In the second, searching part the this album, and for the animated film muscles, in resolute, dizzying, hard- He sought the collaboration of his trumpet is initially given a free rang- Auditie/Audition from 2011. bopping solos, in which every note friend, prop and stay Martin Fondse, ing role, in an enchanting session with strikes home and truly matters. with whom Vloeimans had already tinkling percussion and incantatory Jazz, jazz rock, pop, world music, committed many compositions to strings. Thus, Vloeimans points the classical; Vloeimans wallows in genres But no matter which treatment paper, and intensive labor produced way to the rhythmical third part, in and styles, but mainly sees it all as Vloeimans gives his instrument, the robust orchestral trumpet concerto which the composition is allowed to ‘music’ himself, free from frameworks it’s always as if the trumpeter is Evensong for symphony orchestra, in blossom. Evensong is now driven by and short-sightedness. Vloeimans standing next to us, putting a hand four parts. The piece is Vloeimans all galloping bass and drums, but returns plays a ‘liberated trumpet’, as on our shoulder. Vloeimans’ genius over: drawing on a world of musical somewhere halfway to the interior Volkskrant columnist Martin Bril once doesn’t descend on us of from a inspiration, hardly to be pinned world with a moving, gut-wrenching wrote, and he was right. For Vloeimans, great height, but speaks to us as down on any style or discipline, but solo by Vloeimans. The composition only the persuasive power of his if the trumpeter were a companion, floating somewhere in the free space then bursts apart in a crackling power trumpet counts, the flowing lyricism a soul mate telling us a good story, between orchestral jazz and classical. finale, hinting at inspiration by with which he directly touches the that gives us the strength to go on Prokofiev as well as Bernstein, and a listener’s heart, and evokes sincere, for a while. In the first, eerily beautiful part of fairylike fourth part, in which the trum- unembarrassed emotion. Evensong we hear Vloeimans’ velvety peter is allowed to calm us down again For Vloeimans, the Evensong story trumpet carefully breathing life into with a handful of magisterial notes. What is it about Vloeimans’ tone? began in 2011, with a commission an awakening natural landscape. Sometimes it comes wafting towards from the Limburg Symphony We make out Arabian orchestral Following Evensong, four pieces you, wispy and fleeting, from across Orchestra and its artistic director timbres, and hear how the subtle demonstrate how tightly Vloeimans, 6 7 Fondse and the Netherlands Over ten years ago Martin Fondse march rhythm. That the piece wasn’t Symphony Orchestra have been wrote the evocative and voluminous included in the definitive film score welded together for this album. piece Waterfront for string ensemble at the time is quite understandable: In Lex for example, a moving and solo trumpet, intended for per- being so unusual and surprising, it composition Vloeimans wrote as formance on the waterfront and given might have drawn the full attention of the score for the animated film the breath of life by the movie classic the movie audience, and that wasn’t Auditie/Audition, about Jewish On The Waterfront, featuring Marlon of course the intended effect. musician Lex van Weeren who Brando. So it’s not surprising that this survived Auschwitz by playing the composition presents us with a story After this, we are left amazed and trumpet and leading the camp again, of a sometimes unbearable slightly gasping for air. And we can orchestra. Once again the trumpeter tension. Here, Vloeimans throws conclude that the greatest Dutch tells his story, leading the listener himself into an agile power game with trumpet player has emphatically by the hand towards sensitive piano terse strings, and ultimately sets things manifested himself on this album as exercises, supported by a now right in several breathtaking solos. a prominent orchestral force, and mightily swirling orchestra. that an invigorated Vloeimans can And then we’re surprised by the continue on his border-crossing quest. Requiem is an orchestral adaptation closing track, Your Majesty, written of the eponymous piece Vloeimans for director Pieter de Baan’s film Where will this journey take him, wrote for his album Umai, from 2000. Majesteit. The ferocious jazz – an and which musical domain will A slow and intoxicating composition excited conversation between Vloeimans enter yet? No one can of heavenly beauty, that allows us to hyperactive trumpet, drums, bass and predict this, and that’s probably hear the melancholy Vloeimans: the piano – is introduced by a polyphonic the way Vloeimans likes it. trumpeter who offers comfort within choir, then hoisted onto the shoulders grand orchestral drama, that can and borne through the city as if in Robert van Gijssel, leave no soul unmoved. a parade, in a stately and subdued music journalist for De Volkskrant. 8 9 Eric Vloeimans Michiel Borstlap Sextet. Between 1992 Harmen Fraanje piano) and the Where world music is concerned, Eric Vloeimans (Huizen, 1963) is an and 1998, he leads his own quartet electric band Gatecrash, in which Vloeimans was involved in projects improvising trumpeter and composer with guitarist Anton Goudsmit, rock and funk elements can be with flamenco guitarist Eric Vaarzon who regards the term ‘jazz’ as too bassist Arnold Dooyeweerd and traced (Jeroen van Vliet keyboards, Morel, Latin pianist Ramon Valle, and limiting to describe his music. His work drummer Pieter Bast, with whom Gulli Gudmundsson bass, Jasper the fado-inspired Pessoa of Fernando is characterized by melodic and lyrical he records the CD’s No Realistics, van Hulten drums). With the latter Lameirinhas. power, and a distinctive, individual First Floor and Bestiarium. group, he employs electronic effects sound that is called velvety or whisper- in his trumpet playing for the first Vloeimans has performed as a soloist ing in the more subdued pieces. In 1998, the Edison-winning Bitches time. In addition, he continues to with classical ensembles such as the and Fairy Tales is released, recorded develop other projects, such as the Matangi Quartet, the Calefax Reed Between 1982 and 1988, Vloeimans with pianist John Taylor, bassist Marc band Oliver’s Cinema with accordion Quintet, the Metropole Orchestra, studies at the Rotterdam Conservatory; Johnson and drummer Joey Baron. player Tuur Florizoone and cellist Jörg the Arnhem Philharmonic Orchestra, classical trumpet at first, later the jazz Taylor is also featured on Umai from Brinkmann, and a duo with pianist the Limburg Symphony Orchestra, course. In 1989 he takes lessons in the 2000. In 2001, Vloeimans wins the Boy Florian Weber, which released Live at the Holland Baroque Society and the US with Donald Byrd and forms part Edgar Prize, and in 2001 the Bird Award the Concertgebouw in 2011.

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