Wim Mertens
Category: | componist, solist, hedendaagse componist, hedendaagse muziek |
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Genre(s): | 21ste eeuw / hedendaags, 20ste eeuw, minimal music & neo-klassiek, filmmuziek |
Instrument(s): | piano |
Actual/previous members: | Geert De Vos |
Short description
Mertens is a multi-talented composer whose output includes theatre music, soundtracks and many jingles for radio and television. He refuses to publish or distribute his scores in any way (for the time being). His music can thus only be heard live or on CD. This reflects the composer’s wish to put an emphasis on the sound and not on the written document or reproductions other than recordings.
Biography
The Belgian composer Wim Mertens (born 1953) is an international recording and performing artist who has given countless concerts, as a soloist and with his ensemble, all over Europe, North and Central America, Japan, Thailand and in Russia. He initially studied at the Conservatory of Brussels and graduated in political and social sciences at the K.U. Leuven and Musicology at the R.U. Gent. Mertens is also the author of American Minimal Music (1980), the first book to deal in depth with the school of American repetitive music. His early landmark albums are Vergessen and Struggle for Pleasure (1982), including Close Cover, still one of his classics. In 1998, Mertens became the Cultural Ambassador of Flanders. Since 1980, Mertens has composed pieces in different formats, from short, accessible songs or Lieder to magnanimous and complex three- and four-part cycles, and for different settings: from solo piano to chamber music ensembles and symphony orchestra. He often writes for unusual instrumentations: twelve piccolos, ten bass trombones, thirteen clarinets. Since his recording debut in 1980, titled For Amusement Only, an electronic composition for pinball machines, Wim Mertens has released more than 65 albums.
Selective discography
Heroïdes (2022) Minimal music & neo-classical Wim Mertens |
The Gaze of the West (2020) Minimal music & neo-classical Wim Mertens |
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Certain Nuances Excepted - Live in Bruges (2019) Minimal music & neo-classical Wim Mertens |
That which is not (2018) Minimal music & neo-classical Wim Mertens |
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Nature's Largess (2017) Minimal music & neo-classical Wim Mertens |
Cran aux oeufs (2017) Minimal music & neo-classical Wim Mertens |
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Dust of truths (2016) Minimal music & neo-classical Wim Mertens |
What are we, locks, to do? (2016) Minimal music & neo-classical Wim Mertens |
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Charaktersketch (2015) Minimal music & neo-classical Wim Mertens |
A starry wisdom (2012) Minimal music & neo-classical Wim Mertens |
Selectieve discografie als componist
Made in Belgium (2012) classical crossover, Contemporary folk Aranis, Jan Kuijken, Wouter Vandenabeele, Ward De Vleeschhouwer, Wim Mertens, Arne Van Dongen, Geert Waegeman, Luc De Gezelle (...) |
Related Items
News: | 30 jaar Wim Mertens gevierd met rerelease Struggle for Pleasure (06.03.2012) |
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Press Clips: (Wat is dit?) | Wim Mertens (11.2010) |
Organisations: | Usura Music (uitgever, management) |
External links: | Wim Mertens op Spotify Wim Mertens op Instagram Wim Mertens op Facebook Componistenfiche Wim Mertens |