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Kit Mix #167: Matthijs Van Dijk

 

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“Meanwhile, In Cape Town...”    

 

or     

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“You Don't Have To Have Played With The Night Light Collective To Be Included In This Mix, But It Probably Helps”

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At the moment I've been listening to a lot of new art music from America and a huge amount of new South African art music, so I decided to blend the two worlds together, with a (small) emphasis on pieces that tip it's hat to the “popular” art forms, be it rock/EDM etc. Of the American composers, I've included works by people who really inspire me, such as Caroline Shaw, Andy Akiho, Chris Cerrone and Kate Soper, but I've also included works by composers who I was very fortunate to have met while living in New York and who had a huge impact on what I do, such as Cornelius Dufallo and Missy Mazzoli.

 

Besides for helping me rethink my approach to how I write, the meeting with Mazzoli directly lead to the forming of the South African new music ensemble The Night Light Collective (formerly The ShhArt Ensemble), so I decided to link the worlds together by including music by members of the group (Galina Juritz, Cara Stacey & myself), as well as long time collaborators Lungiswa Plaatjies and Larissa Johnson, who perform here with Madosini and members of the Khoi Khonnexion respectively. To round off this small snippet of the Cape Town new music scene, I've included Meryl van Noie's work for plastic bags “Scratch Study 02”. To stay closer to the "blending of two worlds" idea, I originally wanted to include a piece from the Germany based Signum Quartet's upcoming album of South African works but, as the disc isn't done yet, I decided to instead wrap this up with a piece from their most recent album, a reworking of a Schubert song “Du Bist Die Ruh”, arranged here for string quartet by (South African viola player and brother of mine) Xandi van Dijk, because who doesn't like a little bit of Schubert now and then?

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