Some words about the album "True Stories"
In my compositions and improvisations I always try my best to tell an authentic story that will take the listener along in my musical journey.
The aspect of the infinite greatness of God is definitely something that always inspires me when writing and playing music in which I try to avoid clichés.
While creating new material, sometimes inspired by vivid musical dreams, inspiration can take over and the composition sometimes seems to be writing itself.
“True Stories” is the title track of the album. The different parts of the composition are like chapters of a longer story.
The complexity in my music is not an end in itself. It is the spontaneous unforeseen combinations of Harmony Melody and Rhythm that seem to stretch my imagination as a kind of trinity to eventually arrive at surprising creations in which, in an organic way, odd time signatures, colorful chord progressions and beautiful melodies can go hand in hand.
Being able to play the composed parts and improvising over the chord changes does challenge me and my fellow musicians to grow musically on sometimes still untrodden roads
Music that I have drawn inspiration from in the past include the repertoire of Allan Holdsworth (“Allan” is a tribute to the British guitar legend who passed away in 2017) Scott Henderson (Tribal Tech guitarist) Frank Gambale and Steve Vai.
Fellow musicians Frans Vollink (Tristan) and Niels Voskuil form the basis of this project. I have been in contact with Frans for some time and knew that as a drummer Niels has a good intuition for this branch of fusion. The album was recorded in 2 days in studio “Het Atelier”, (not counting the pre-production, which must have been many hours) After never having played together before, the song “Awestruck” was recorded first in 1 take, almost all improvisations were played “live” in this one weekend, these moments were downright magical.
The two guest musicians (Marco Minnemann and Valeriy Stepanov) are musicians that I admire a lot and that I knew would fit well in the story. When I finished the pre-production of the song “True Stories” I knew that Marco Minnemann had to be the man who had to play the drums. After asking him, he was immediately very enthusiastic about my music and delivered the drum tracks for the song
A similar story applies to Valeriy Stepanov, who, with his fantastic phrasing and technique, has added two beautiful solos and chords to “Serenity Now!” (Frank Costanza, Episode 159 of “Seinfeld”) and, the album's opening track, "Fifths." which by the way, refers to the chords harmonized in perfect fifths using the Roland VG99 guitar synth.
The aspect of the infinite greatness of God is definitely something that always inspires me when writing and playing music in which I try to avoid clichés.
While creating new material, sometimes inspired by vivid musical dreams, inspiration can take over and the composition sometimes seems to be writing itself.
“True Stories” is the title track of the album. The different parts of the composition are like chapters of a longer story.
The complexity in my music is not an end in itself. It is the spontaneous unforeseen combinations of Harmony Melody and Rhythm that seem to stretch my imagination as a kind of trinity to eventually arrive at surprising creations in which, in an organic way, odd time signatures, colorful chord progressions and beautiful melodies can go hand in hand.
Being able to play the composed parts and improvising over the chord changes does challenge me and my fellow musicians to grow musically on sometimes still untrodden roads
Music that I have drawn inspiration from in the past include the repertoire of Allan Holdsworth (“Allan” is a tribute to the British guitar legend who passed away in 2017) Scott Henderson (Tribal Tech guitarist) Frank Gambale and Steve Vai.
Fellow musicians Frans Vollink (Tristan) and Niels Voskuil form the basis of this project. I have been in contact with Frans for some time and knew that as a drummer Niels has a good intuition for this branch of fusion. The album was recorded in 2 days in studio “Het Atelier”, (not counting the pre-production, which must have been many hours) After never having played together before, the song “Awestruck” was recorded first in 1 take, almost all improvisations were played “live” in this one weekend, these moments were downright magical.
The two guest musicians (Marco Minnemann and Valeriy Stepanov) are musicians that I admire a lot and that I knew would fit well in the story. When I finished the pre-production of the song “True Stories” I knew that Marco Minnemann had to be the man who had to play the drums. After asking him, he was immediately very enthusiastic about my music and delivered the drum tracks for the song
A similar story applies to Valeriy Stepanov, who, with his fantastic phrasing and technique, has added two beautiful solos and chords to “Serenity Now!” (Frank Costanza, Episode 159 of “Seinfeld”) and, the album's opening track, "Fifths." which by the way, refers to the chords harmonized in perfect fifths using the Roland VG99 guitar synth.