Organist and composer Jacob Lekkerkerker returns after four years to the Kleine Zaal of the Muziekgebouw to perform once again on the Fokker organ. This time he is joined by violist and musical polymath Oene van Geel, with whom he has regularly collaborated since their meeting at the Bimhuis in 2011. The highlight of the morning is the premiere of Lekkerkerker’s composition encompassing five hundred years of sound history from Amsterdam’s organs and bells. During the first lockdown, he recorded samples of the sounds of organs and bells from all districts of Amsterdam and processed them in the studio into the electronic composition Inside Outside II. The instruments sampled include the 500-year-old bell (1516) from the village of Sloten, the renowned organ of the Oude Kerk (1724), the Vrijheid carillon (1952) in Nieuw-West, the new hyper-organ in the Orgelpark, amounting to a total of eleven organs and bells. The twelfth instrument featured in the performance is the 31-tone organ (1950) of the Huygens-Fokker Foundation, which will be played live during the concert. The programme also includes music by the 16th-century Dutch composer Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck, who died exactly 400 years ago, an improvisation by Lekkerkerker and Van Geel on Samuel Barber’s Adagio for Strings, and a work by Hans Eugen Frischknecht from the distinctive Fokker organ repertoire, composed following his visit to Amsterdam and Haarlem in the 1960s.
Jacob Lekkerkerker (1975) studied organ and improvisation in The Hague and Lyon, and continued his composition studies at Goldsmiths, University of London. He specialises in studio and online compositions created from samples of historical instruments such as organs and bells, in collaboration with sound engineer Nick Powell at Goldsmiths Music Studios. Since 2016, as director of music and titular organist of the Oude Kerk in Amsterdam, Lekkerkerker has developed a tradition of spatial music with the famous Vater-Müller organ. He has won the National Organ Improvisation Competition, the Sweelinck-Müller Prize, the Prix Special Englert-Marchal (Biarritz, France), and the Jur Naessens Music Prize.
Violist and composer Oene van Geel (1972) is a musical adventurer inspired by jazz, Indian music, chamber music, and free improvisation. He performs in ensembles such as Zapp 4, Estafest, The Nordanians, and OOOO, and regularly appears as a guest soloist. Van Geel has composed dozens of works for a wide range of ensembles. In addition to works for his own groups, he has written for the David Kweksilber Big Band, Amstel Quartet, Amsterdam Sinfonietta, Matangi Quartet, Calefax, Tetzepi Bigtet, Ricciotti Ensemble, Duo Eva Tebbe and Merel Junge (harp and violin), and music theatre companies including Schweigman&, Theater Sonnevanck (youth theatre), and Orkest Max Tak. As a composer and performer, he is also involved in theatre productions by Theun Mosk, Saartje van Camp, Herman van Baar, and Marcel Sijm. In 2013, he won the prestigious VPRO/Boy Edgar Prize.