Creative curiosity

​Klaas de Vries is a versatile composer with an open mind, inspired by his predecessors and with an eye for overlooked composers. He has passed on his creative curiosity to his daughter, violinist Jellantsje de Vries. Together with the pianist Bobby Mitchell, she has won critical acclaim for her richly varied and original recitals that bridge centuries of musical history. 

Their debut CD Kraakhelder (2022) received rave reviews. The NRC gave it five stars and said it was "a must for anyone with open ears". ​Impressive is the astonishingly original violin sonata from 1926 by American composer Ruth Crawford Seeger, which they will also perform at the Paleiskerk. It's a sonata that seamlessly blends folk music and modernism. They combine this masterpiece with Gregory Charette's arrangement of the ballad De Fortune me doy pleindre et loer, in which the medieval composer Guillaume de Machaut sings of the cruel capriciousness of fate. Equally capricious are the two Satires for violin and piano by Frederic Rzewski.

Pianist Matthijs van Wijhe will perform two piano works by Klaas de Vries and present the world premiere of Radial Web by Christina Viola Oorebeek. She started her career as a dancer and singer/songwriter. At the age of fifty she became captivated by new music and began to study with Klaas de Vries. Since then she has developed into one of the most compelling composers in the Netherlands. Her work is performed all over the world. Radial Web is an exciting piece for piano and electronics, in which she fully explores the sonic possibilities of the Fazioli grand piano in the Paleiskerk.