Michel van der Aa

— listening CD — Classical By von Tilzer; Alkan-Heymann; Heymann; Chauvin; van der Wel; Keizer; van der Horst; van Staalen; Dijker. By Marion von Tilzer. Classical. Listening CD. Published by Challenge Records (NX.CC72295). Price: $16.00 SATB choir, organ — choir and piano part — Secular, 20th Century Composed by Michel Berthomier, Michel Roger. Secular, 20th Century. Choir and piano part. 16 pages. Published by Editions a Coeur Joie (CJ.A112200006). Price: $9.00 — 2 CDs — By Samuel Ramey; June Anderson; Michel Senechal; Brigitte Balleys; Michel Trempont; Helene Garetti; Frederica Von Stade. By Jules Massenet (1842-1912). 2 CDs. Published by RCA Legacy (NX.RCA60593). Price: $34.00 concert band — full set — Mars van de jonge prins van Friesland / Mars van de Heer van der Duyn / Mars van de Staten van Holland . Composed by Jan van Beekum. Arrangements of Classical Compositions/Festive Marches/ Wedding/Birthday/Classical Marches/Festive Overtures. Classic Arrangement. Full set. Published by Molenaar Edition (ML.011677070). Price: $163.00 concert band — score only — Mars van de jonge prins van Friesland / Mars van de Heer van der Duyn / Mars van de Staten van Holland . Composed by Jan van Beekum. Arrangements of Classical Compositions/Festive Marches/ Wedding/Birthday/Classical Marches/Festive Overtures. Classic Arrangement. Score only. Published by Molenaar Edition (ML.011677070-S). Price: $27.00 Michel van der Aa (born 1970, The Netherlands) is a composer to whom music is more than just organized sound or a structure of notes. One of the enduring features in his idiom is a strong theatrical imagination. Dramatis personae take on various identities. Musicians who are visible on the stage are either not always audible or they interact with their electronic evil sisters, processed sounds on tape. A theatrical, virtual space comes into being which is not confined to the concert hall but is extended into the mind of the audience. Van der Aa plays with this conceptual space the same way M.C Escher, the graphic artist, made perspectival illusion clash with the flat surface of the paper. For Van der Aa sound is something moldable, something that can constantly assume other forms, sometimes recognizable, sometimes not, - exactly the same thing that fascinates a playwright in the human spirit and its bodily affectations. This is not coincidental; Van der Aa is indeed a playwright in his music. People are flexible or stubborn, dominate or get the short end of the stick, reinforce or counteract each other, just like Van der Aa’s sounds, affecting audiences with expressive power. When he doesn’t provide images with his music, these arise in the mind of even the most unimaginative listener, or else the musicians visualize the dramatic potential. After training as a music recording engineer at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague, Michel van der Aa studied composition with Diderik Wagenaar, Gilius van Bergeijk and Louis Andriessen . Despite the fact that his teachers were all prominent representatives of the ‘Hague School’, which did not fail to leave some imprint on his style - notably a constructivist approach and the use of rhythm and chords as structural elements - his music is never ‘Hague’ in spirit. Rather than angular and monolithic, it is strikingly subtle, playful, poetic and transparent. Yet it is not expressive or melodious in the traditional sense. Van der Aa is a child of his time. Where his teachers used to struggle with the doctrines of serial music, he uses the atonal idiom freely. And the computer for him is a natural tool - not for composing, but for producing his sound tracks. Van der Aa uses these soundtracks as an additional instrument, a way to extend the vocabulary of his music. Van der Aa’s interest in the visual and dramatic side of music made him experiment with miming and acting of musicians in his performances. Most recently, Van der Aa completed a program in film directing at the New York Film Academy. The a