Louis Andriessen is one of the most remarkable and influential composers of the past half century. His European variant of minimal music displays affinity to the work of Steve Reich, Philip Glass and Terry Riley, but also absorbs influences of jazz, rock, Stravinsky and early music. He even based his quartet Facing Death on Charlie Parker’s Ornithology. After all categories also exist in order for composers to be able to think and create outside of them!

One of his best-known works, De Stijl, refers to the artistic school of the same name which included Piet Mondrian among its exponents. The four voices sing about the ‘pure lines’ which were so important to the painter, who – as we learn – was also a star on the dance floor. The work calls for a large-scale ensemble that weaves between jazz, Corelli, beats, Bach, boogie-woogie, Stravinsky, thus displaying the hallmarks of a full-blooded Andriessen work.

conductor Etienne Siebens