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For years already I have been wondering what the musical equivalent is of a journal, or a travel diary,
Similar to someone recording his thoughts and feelings in a diary at the end of the day, I wanted to create a form in which someone thinks, feels and remembers in sound.
It may imply bits of text, but sound is the main fabric.
It is me, remembering parts of my life.
Very concrete, direct sounds of a place I remember.
Or an interpretation of that place.
Or me remembering old work, unfinished work.
Remembering books, films, people.
All those memories make their appearance, sonically.
I start placing them next to each other with hard cuts, without any overlaps.
Some memories last a few seconds, some more than 10 minutes.
And some act like a work within a work.
It’s a composition of about 80 small blocks coming together to construct one tale, not seamless, but concise and evident.

I am looking for a new form. The only composer I know who has worked with the composition of personal travel journals based on concrete sounds is Luc Ferrari. I haven’t come across the diary-version of this form. Not as an autonomous composition.

Although originally intended as a work for instruments and speakers, I decided to make ‘alles dat herinnert’ into a pure listening piece, without any visual distractions.
5 loudspeakers are positioned in a dark space, and the audience is invited to sit on lazy chairs or cushions.
It’s a plea I want to make in defence of the ear, by now one of the most underrated senses.

A good tape piece, well monitored over good loudspeakers, can be an overwhelmingly musical and spatial experience.
I find it important to be able to experience music as a composed, spatial event, with full intensity and no distraction, interruption or intervention of any other media.