Good Night Dear Heart (Text by Robert Richardson and Mark Twain)
Warm summer sun,
Shine kindly here,
Warm southern wind,
Blow softly here.
Green sod above,
Lie light, lie light.
Good night, dear heart,
Good night, good night.
Dan Forrest about the piece:
“A few years ago, my brother and his wife found out that the four month old girl that they were soon to adopt from Ethiopia had fallen ill and passed away. They had been making plans for her, staring endlessly at her picture, and loving her from across the ocean, so the news was devastating.
God’s plans were not for her to ever see the people who had loved her from halfway around the world, but for her to be taken instead to His loving arms. For me, life circumstances (whether euphoric or tragic) don’t usually translate into musical inspiration; the two typically remain separate. The night they received this news, though, I found myself longing to pour out a musical elegy.
My search for a suitable text led me to a picture from a cemetery in my hometown (Elmira, NY), where the great American author Mark Twain and his family are buried. My brother and I, from our youth, have known the poem that Twain placed on the tombstone of his beloved daughter Susy, when she died unexpectedly at age 24 and left him heartbroken.
I was stunned by the bittersweet irony of this text being from our hometown, and in honor of a beloved daughter who died unexpectedly. I wrote this setting that night; it was quickly added to an upcoming concert and premiered only one week later, as an elegy for Etsegenet and a reminder of the orphans of Ethiopia.”
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Category Archives: contemporary music
Deze synergie, wat een pracht. Julija Hartig (viool) en Reineke Broekhans (piano) spelen Žebeljan, Enescu, Say.
Julija Hartig (viool) en Reineke Broekhans (piano) spelen
– Dark Velvet (Isodora Žebeljan)
– Vioolsonate no.3, 1e deel (Georges Enescu)
– Sonate voor piano en viool, Op.7, 1e en 2e deel (Fazil Say)
Concertzender-opname, 22-4-2026, Utrecht.
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Hedendaagse muziek: fraai album ‘Vida’ (2026) biedt sterk oeuvre-overzicht van componiste Misha Cvijovic
Van het veelzijdige werk van componiste, pianiste en sound artist Misha Cvijović is op het WERGO-label in februari 2026 een boeiend overzichtsalbum verschenen, getiteld ‘Vida’. Het album is onder andere beschikbaar op streaming platforms als Spotify en Apple Music. De rondgang langs het werk van deze mij voorheen onbekende componiste heeft me aangenaam verrast en heb ik al menigmaal beluisterd. Ik werd onder meer direct gegrepen door het uit 2013/14 daterende orkestwerk ‘Lica Persefone’, een prachtstuk waarin Cvijović zonder verlies van eigenheid een sterke invloed van Messiaen laat doorklinken.
Luister maar…
Op het album ‘Vida’ staat van Misha Cvijovic nog ander fraai werk, in kleinere (kamer)bezetting en in elektronische setting. Voor wie geïnteresseerd is in hedendaagse muziek is ‘Vida’ een absolute aanrader.
Best releases of 2013 | Pieter de Rooij’s Top 15
01. Anupama Bhagwat (India) – Ether | Raga/Hindustani
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02. Valentina Lisitsa (USA) – Rachmaninov: The Piano Concertos | Western Classical
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03. Valentina Lisitsa (USA) – Valentina Lisitsa plays Liszt | Western Classical
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04. Sarah Jarosz (USA) – Build Me Up From Bones | Bluegrass/Folk/Americana
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05. Buika (Spain) – La Noche Mas Larga | Flamenco/Jazz
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06. Rokia Traoré (Mali) – Beautiful Africa | Blues/Rock
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07 Anais Mitchell & Jefferson Hamer (USA) – Child Ballads | Folk
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08. Debashish Bhattacharya (India) – Beyond the Ragasphere | Raga/Hindustani/Crossover
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09. Anoushka Shankar (India) – Traces of You | Raga/Crossover
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10. Natacha Atlas (Belgium/UK) – Live in Toulouse | Arabian pop
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11. Valerie June (USA) – Pushin’ Against A Stone | Folk/Blues/Soul
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12. Jyotsna Srikanth (India) – Call Of Bengalore | Raga/Carnatic/Crossover
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13. Eva Quartet & Hector Zazou (Bulgaria/France) – The Arch | Crossover/Experimental
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14. Hilary Hahn (USA) – In 27 Pieces : The Hilary Hahn Encores | Western Classical
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15. Various Artists (Brazil) – Daora: Underground Sounds of Urban Brasil | Hiphop/Afro/Dub
For those funky lines and great soulgrooves… MonoNeon! (my favourite bass player on YT)
Gosh, I really love this guy’s playing. I embedded only two examples here, but he has tons of stuff on his YouTubechannel. It’s Dywane Thomas Jr., as an artist going by the name of ‘MonoNeon’. He’s a young bass player from the United States. I found his videos a year ago on YouTube.
Yes, once I stumbled upon his channel I couldn’t of course miss his funny colourful presentation and his peculiar way of playing (and dressing up) his instrument – while being right handed, Dywane plays a right-handed bass guitar upside down with the left hand! – but right from the start I was infatuated by his bass playing alone. Awesome funky lines and soulgrooves all over the place.
It’s also obvious from MonoNeon’s videos that he’s an adventurous musician, looking for ways to try out new things and further develop his playing. Outside of his blues- soul- and funky homebase his playing of other genres is also pretty amazing. He knows his Zappa and his Coltrane and he even does a few videos where microtonal playing is involved, ranging from Indian raga-related to modern Western stuff.
I made a YouTube-playlist with a great selection of his videos, you can play my playlist from here. Otherwise, you can of course also visit his channel. This dude’s playing is a real delight, so check out what he’s got in store for you. Enjoy!
R.I.P. Otto Ketting (3 sept. 1935 – 13 dec. 2012)
In zijn woonplaats Den Haag is op 13 december 2012 dirigent en componist Otto Ketting op 77-jarige leeftijd overleden na een kort ziekbed. De Concertzender herdenkt hem met verschilende uitzendingen. |
What a wonderful sound! John Cage for Balinese gamelan
I like to hear more of this ‘John Cage for Balinese gamelan’-project. Sounds wonderful!
Amelia Cuni’s beautiful interpretation of John Cage’s ‘Solo for Voice 58: 18 Microtonal Ragas’
Early September 2012 I heard (and met) Italian dhrupad singer Amelia Cuni in Göttingen, where she did a concert titled Cosmopolit@n Ragas. It was a beautiful musical event in two parts, starting out with Amelia Cuni’s performance of a raga in traditional dhrupad style. Then she took things in another direction by presenting her dhrupad-styled improvisational skills in a very different musical framework: she performed John Cage‘s Solo for Voice 58: 18 Microtonal Ragas. Here I like to share a beautiful recording of Amelia Cuni interpreting this work of John Cage. Enjoy!
https://youtube.com/watch?v=O-MJUcxriF8
Impressive overtones of Natascha Nikeprelevic
An artist I’ve been admiring for many years is Natascha Nikeprelevic. With overtone singing as her basic means of musical expression she performs, improvises and interprets contemporary music. For a reference: on her MySpace page she mentions Pina Bausch, Kazuo Ohno, Robert Wilson, Michael Vetter and Karlheinz Stockhausen as her most important influences. Here’s a beautiful excerpt from ‘Alice in Wonderland’, her ‘journey of the human natural voice to the wonderland of synthetic sounds’.
Is there anything Natascha Nikeprelevic can’t do with her voice?
In Natascha Nikeprelevic’s work harmonic melodies and overtone arias emerge from what seem to be amorphous sound structures, noises and almost bizarre atonalities. Since 1997 she collaborates with Michael Vetter. Natascha Nikeprelevic has performed all over Europe and in the Far East and besides performing she also lectures for programmes of musicology, dance/theatre and jazz at several universities in and outside Europe.
An overtone singing workshop led by Natascha Nikeprelevic
If you want to hear from herself about her music and career check out this interview with Deutschland Radio Berlin.
RECITAL’REZITATIV for voice and tambura
And speaking of Natascha’s work, I can’t resist referring to a video and a soundscape I made for fun a few years ago, in which her voice is one of the predominant elements. This one…