Chris Abelen Releases ‘Remembering Willem Breuker’ — A Personal Tribute to a Dutch Jazz Legend

About the single

Dutch composer, musician and arranger Chris Abelen is releasing ‘Remembering Willem Breuker’ — a composition born out of years of close collaboration with Willem Breuker, the composer, saxophonist and bandleader who passed away in Amsterdam in 2010. Abelen spent three and a half years as a member of the celebrated Willem Breuker Kollektief, and later worked closely with Breuker until his death, taking on the instrumentation of his new compositions. This unique position — both inside the band and behind the scenes — gives the track an intimacy and authenticity that sets it apart from the typical tribute recording.

The music: a deliberate build

The single opens with a solo bass clarinet, before a soprano saxophone takes over the melody — both instruments closely associated with Breuker himself. The soprano melody is played by Floris van der Vlugt. The idea for this instrumentation was inspired by the famous Requiem scene in the film Amadeus, in which a dying Mozart dictates the Confutatis to Salieri — a high, fragile melody gradually surrounded by more and more voices. Different notes, of course, for there is only one Mozart, but the same underlying idea. Layer by layer, more instruments join in, until the track blossoms into the full, colourful orchestral sound that was the Kollektief’s signature. That structure is anything but accidental. Abelen recalls sitting beside Breuker at the piano, and the moment a melody had taken shape, calling out: ‘Done! Don’t touch it!’ — only to be met with a look of disbelief from Breuker, who insisted many more instruments were needed. ‘A losing battle, of course,’ Abelen says. ‘In the end, every available instrument joined in happily. But in this piece, I finally get to do it my way — and then arrive exactly where Willem always wanted to end up.’