Douwe Eisenga: The Border
Butler Records / V2 Records

Douwe Eisenga: The Flood, Requiem
Butler Records / V2 Records

Appreciation for Dutch composer Douwe Eisenga has grown over the past few decades and with any luck should continue with the release of these new collections, each worthy of attention for different reasons. Certainly the recognition he received for his 2019 TRPTK release For Mattia accounts in part for that increase in profile; though the material on that solo piano recording was rooted in solemn subject matter—the suicide of a young woman—the elegiac material he crafted for it resonated with a great many listeners. Tailoring the music to a concept is a strategy he returned to for his 2021 release Open, which is ostensibly about listening without judgment, and once again for The Border, which has to do with, in his words, “conflicts, incomprehension, prejudices and impregnable borders in people's minds.” However different his projects are, they're all connected by the deftness with which Eisenga integrates his influences—minimalism, pop, rock, and classical. It's a hybrid custom-designed to appeal to fans of Nyman, Glass, and John Adams.

In one sense, The Border wouldn't exist were it not for Eisenga's 2021 music-theatre production Grenspaal 369. He dedicated much of 2020 to composing the work, which has to do with the disruption into a couple's lives by a boat refugee and which saw the pandemic postpone its premiere to September 2021 and then postpone it again when a further lockdown occurred. With time on his hands, he decided to take music from the piece and create a new ten-part instrumental treatment that while related to Grenspaal 369 is also separate. Merging piano, brass, percussion, and electronic textures, The Border is elevated by the contributions of saxophonist Erik-Jan de With, whose horn lends the piece much of its defining character. Drum patterns give the material rhythmic heft, but the tapestry Eisenga creates from the multiple instrument timbres is as critical to the impact of the material.

Dramatic brass chords (presumably digitally generated) introduce the work forebodingly in “At the Coast,” after which “Encounter” accents lilting piano figures with tolling bells, the combination perpetuating the ominous tone of the intro. When de With's soprano sax enters, the moment calls to mind Jess Gillam's “Suspirium” (from 2020's Time) and is as haunting. Building incrementally, the arrangement swells ever more forcefully until an abrupt deflation ends the piece. Shifting the focus from heavy drums to animated mallet interplay, “Perfect Picture” maintains the tension of the opening tracks as it weaves piano, brass, and percussion into an urgent expression. “Here” assumes its character from the vibraphone pattern that initiates it and from the huffing horns and pounding drums that come after. The coupling of de With's soprano sax with the composer's piano makes the plaintive “Coming Back” one of the release's most memorable pieces.

Eisenga's handling of the slow-build from piano-centred delicacy to drum-pounding declamation in “The Border” testifies to his highly developed skill-set. Again he benefits from de With's presence in the hush of his guest's opening expression and the wail that comes after (at such moments, the impression forms that he should have been credited on The Border as the featured soloist). The forty-two-minute release draws to a dramatic close with “Departure,” its contents referencing one last time the melodic themes and rhythms that came before. Eisenga smartly shifts the presentation from one track to the next while ensuring that the music's haunting tone acts as a connecting thread. A clear sense of a voyage having been undertaken and completed is conveyed by the arc of the music as well as the track titles. Expertly crafted and imaginatively scored, The Border should in no way be thought of as a work secondary to Grenspaal 369 but as a satisfying statement on its own terms.

A considerably larger-scaled work is The Flood, Requiem, a setting for alto, choir, and orchestra that after its first presentation in 2003, fifty years after the North Sea flood of 1953, was followed by twenty performances in The Netherlands, Romania, and America. Texts for the nine-part work come from a variety of sources, including The Flood, Zeeland 1953 and Nieuwerkerk by British-born Canadian poet Christopher Levenson, a Spanish translation of The Sea, Elegy by nineteenth-century Russian poet Vasily Zhukovsky, a meditation by fifteenth-century Italian Dominican friar/preacher Hieronymus Savonarola, and excerpts from the Latin Mass for the Dead. Whereas The Border presents recently created material, The Flood, Requiem is a reissue of a 2003 release originally issued under the title Requiem 1953 in a digital form and then six years ago as The Flood, Requiem, again as a digital release. The latest reissue, now marking the seventieth anniversary of the flood disaster that hit the Netherlands and killed more than 1800 people and thousands of animals, arrives as a digipack with a booklet featuring the libretto and the diary Eisenga kept during the time of the work's writing. The seventy-minute performance is by the Zeeuws Orkest, conducted by Joan Berkhemer, the Zeeuws Philharmonisch Koor, and altoist Simone Veder.

Eisenga clearly understood his intentions from the outset, that the work should be accessible to young listeners as well as those who directly experienced the flood and that it should be comforting, uplifting, and optimistic, his ultimate goal to accentuate the resilience people show in the face of calamity. “Introitus” sets a memorable introductory stage by alternating spoken verses and solemn choir utterances, the composer's orchestral writing sensitively tailored to the vocal passages. The action heats up in “Abyssus Misericordiae,” where choir vocalizations initially call to mind “The People Are the Heroes Now” from Adams' Nixon in China and the music gains drive from mallet percussion and drums and delicacy from sections featuring acoustic guitar, harp, piano, and flute; Veder emerges here too, the solo voice an effective complement to the choir. With an excerpt from Levenson's The Flood, Zeeland 1953 surveying the damage, “The Village” is understandably plaintive. The influence of minimalism is evident in the work (it's possible to hear similarities between it and Glass's Akhnaten), but Eisenga liberates himself from the constraints the style can impose by weaving into the design contrasting styles and moods, varying the vocal presentation, and crafting a rich score that makes full use of the resources an orchestra offers. Hear, for example the lovely pairing of acoustic guitar and viola with which “All Summer Long” begins, the chamber-styled setting a moving solo spotlight for Veder. As epic a pitch as The Flood, Requiem in places rises to, there are also moments of delicacy, the first half of “Kyrie / Lux Aeterna” and the artful “Requiem Aeternam” two prime examples.

Janruary 2023