Muziek Centrum Nederland

Richard Rijnvos

When the German artist Joseph Beuys says that every person is an artist, this is not a noncommittal statement. His work, in which he makes use of elementary materials such as felt and grease and highly ritualistic performances, has a direct link to the myth of his survival after his aeroplane crashed in Crimea in 1944. Art is not something you can be involved in half-heartedly, art is of vital importance. This dedication is an eye-catching characteristic of Richard Rijnvos’ work. On 19 April his composition Riflesso sull'acqua for English horn and orchestra will be premiered at the ZaterdagMatinee in the Amsterdam Concertgebouw.

One can clearly see this dedication when one visits his carefully constructed website, a world full of surprises. The concentrated focus can be heard in his music. It is not constructed thoughtlessly. The notes are suffused with necessity. Rijnvos plays this game seriously and with dedication. This is interrupted by catchy dancing passages, with a glimpse at another composition, with a leisurely, sensual atmospheric description in which he lets Venice loom up, veiled in morning mist. Like a ray of sunlight that brushes the wing of a tropical butterfly and makes it sparkle in a breathtaking feast of fluorescent colours.

A concentrated, frowning face that, through a playful idea, suddenly brightens into an amused smile. A melodic line around which an aura forms, a radiance the instruments only achieve through their ensemble playing.
In Block Beuys, written as a reaction to the eponymous collection by the artist in the Hessisches Landesmuseum in Darmstadt, Rijnvos lets you roam around in a mythical world full of charged resonances. Against a backdrop of invoking and pulsing harmonies, Beuys repeatedly declares: "Everybody is an artist." A message of vital importance, of dedication and of hope.

René van Peer

3 characteristic statements by Richard:
  • In recent years I have developed a method of composition that has produced an enormous breakthrough in my harmonic thinking. In short, this method guarantees that a hyperchromatic harmony can occur in an entirely natural way alongside a tonal chord. I find this egalitarianism in the use of harmonies exceptionally liberating. Since then the obsolete discussion on tonality is for me a thing of the past. Even though this controversy will no doubt be kept alive vehemently and perpetually by hardcore avant-gardists and their opponents, the sentimental followers of Sacred Tonality.
  • Style has a striking directness. Whether we listen to music, admire a painting, read a novel or watch a film, Style manages to manifest itself as a protagonist without fail within mere seconds. Indeed, Style cannot easily be expressed in words, but this is exactly why reflecting on it is so fascinating. Nevertheless, Style is never the point of departure in my creative process. During the expedition to new, unknown sounds, many areas are covered, such as: Concept, Design, Structure, Process, Form, Development, Character, Mood, Meaning. In fact, Style is the unsuspected end of the line.
  • I detest modern music.
Richard Rijnvos
concise personal portrait

Richard Rijnvos’ interests:

  • Unexpected encounters with cats, strolling through Venice and eating grilled scallops.


Richard Rijnvos’ inspiration:

  • Books rather than writers, paintings rather than painters, plays rather than playwrights, films rather than film directors, dance performances rather than choreographers, compositions rather than composers.
  • To give some examples: Palomar by the Italian author Italo Calvino, Die Zweite Heimat by the German filmmaker Edgar Reitz, Torqued Ellipses by the American artist Richard Serra, Sincerity and Authenticity by the American culture philosopher Lionel Trilling, Victory Boogie Woogie by the Dutch painter Piet Mondriaan, Sinfonietta by the Dutch/Czech choreographer Jirí Kylián, Not I by the Irish playwright Samuel Beckett.
  • And also an endless list of CDs which does not include a single work by Dmitry Shostakovich, but which does include O Vos Omnes by Alessandro Grandi (1586-1630).
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