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On
Christmas Day at 23.00, Inventions for Radio presents work by the artist
Sarah van Sonsbeeck. This programme, made specially for the
Concertzender, has been inspired by memories from her youth.
 Sarah van Sonsbeeck explains the work: "As an artist, I have been interested in silence
since 2006. In that
year, I
both graduated from the
Rietveld Academy and had terrible
neighbours.
In desperation I sent them a letter in which I asked them
to
pay rent for that part of
my house that they occupied with their noise.
Of course
they didn't respond but I did discover what art could be and
what it meant to be an artist.”
Never boring
“My first reaction when the Concertzender asked me to produce an art
work for the
radio was hesitant. What did
I know about classical music?”
“But one of my heroes is the American composer John Cage who once said:
"If
you listen to Beethoven, it’s always the same, but if you listen to
traffic, it’s
always different." So I started digging into my memories
to see whether I really didn't have any that were concerned with
classical music, and almost immediately
I found myself standing in my
father's shed. I remember that while he worked there, making things out
of wood, he was always listening to Bach and Haydn,
and sometimes he
even whistled along within the music.”
“Wim Janssen from the Rijksacademie did the same thing. In homage to Wim,
you can listen to my father at work in the Rijksacademie van Beeldende
Kunsten
in Amsterdam, with thanks to Stephan, Els and Wim. You then enter my second memory.”
 May I play the organ?
“I have an uncle who has a secret love of organ music.
The story goes
that whenever
he visited a church that was
new to him he would ask if he
could play the organ. Is it really true?
I don't know for sure, but in
memory of my uncle I have
asked Ton Donders to play the Vater Müller
orgel (from 1724)
in the Oude Kerk in Amsterdam, an organ that he has
never played before. This work is actually also inspired by the
need for
experimentation and practice, something that every artist has a love-hate relation-
ship with…
Even though Ton is very experienced, this is an enormous organ and has
the reputation of being one of the most difficult and demanding to play.
This is made worse by the fact that the organ, despite looking and
sounding magnificent to a novice like me, is actually in desperate need
of maintenance. The Oude Kerk is currently investigating the possibilities for renovation.
And if you listen very carefully you can also hear a Christmas carol.”
“To finish, you can listen to Aart Staartjes reading one of the
Christmas stories
that I was so obsessed by as a child that I still
listened to them in January and sometimes even at Easter.”
Broadcast:
Wednesday 25 December 2013, 23.00.
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