Search - Sandra van Veen :: Jeroen Van Veen: Piano Music

Repetition of motifs within a composition is nothing new: Solers Fandango, Bachs Chaconne and Pachelbels Canon, to name just three examples, all make use of it. But for Dutch composer Jeroen van Veen it is the most important element - the essence, as it were - of music. Rooted in tonality, and subject to the interaction and choices of the performers, it can prove immensely powerful. Indeed, it was on this premise that van Veen launched his compositional career with two volumes of 24 Minimal Preludes; this exciting 5-CD release contains follow-up pieces to those works, ones that reflect the composers approach to music as the structuring of LEGO® bricks the individual components that create variation within a composition. As well as Incanto a series of compositions for two or more keyboards in which the music develops slowly, utilising techniques such as fluctuation of speed the release also includes NLXL, a musical illustration of Hollands landscape patterns as seen from the air, based on a book of the same name by Dutch photographer Karel Tomeï. The work is created by way of a multitrack recording with a variety of keyboard instruments, with large segments versus smaller segments of The Netherlands landscape expressed through longer and shorter note values. The composer himself is the main performer here, assisted by Frank Steijens on the carillon and his wife for works requiring four hands or two pianos. Described as the leading exponent of minimalism in Holland today, van Veens hypnotic, trance-inducing music makes for an experience unlike any other, transporting the listener to another place through ever-changing soundscapes. Other information: Recorded on August 2011 (NLXL), December 2013 & January 2014, Van Veen Productions, Studio 1, Culemborg, The Netherlands. Booklet includes notes by the composer as well as artist biographies. An extensive discography of past Brilliant Classics releases of Van Veens music is also included.