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The Complete Musical Works of Agnes Jama
Agnes Jama, Soesja Citroen

Marcel Worms

The Complete Musical Works of Agnes Jama

Price: € 12.95
Format: CD
Label: Challenge Classics
UPC: 0608917219227
Catnr: CC 72192
Release date: 05 September 2008
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Label
Challenge Classics
UPC
0608917219227
Catalogue number
CC 72192
Release date
05 September 2008
Album
Artist(s)
Composer(s)
EN
NL
DE

About the album

Agnes Jama was born in Dürnstein on the Danube (in the former Austria-Hungary) from the union between Louise van Raders, a noble-born Dutch woman and painter and the Slovenian impressionist Matija Jama. Program booklets showed that she was a pianist who played from a mainly traditional and impressionistic repertoire, however every now and then she would play works of Yugoslavian composers. She was open to music from all corners of the globe, the intention being that the propagation of such music would lead to a new cosmopolitan style. She wasn’t afraid to publicly express harsh criticism for the sterile music of the post-war era. She saw no value in atonality and, in direct opposition to the current fashion of the day, she composed her own melodic pieces in the style of romantic impressionism.

Mainly in the 1950’s, she composed four chamber music works. This is how a Suite for Violin and Piano, a Sonatina for Piano, a Sonata for Cello and Piano and a cycle of Three Songs for Voice and Piano came into being. Her fifth, and last, composition clearly stands out in her small oeuvre, a piece of work that she completed in 1970: Vocatio for Mezzo-soprano, Clarinet and Piano. Here, she showed that she didn’t shy away from experimentation, as if the experimental era in which she lived and a course by composer Ton de Leeuw had clearly left their mark. In what would be her swansong, she created her own abstract-expressionistic vocals, after endlessly studying singing from all over the world.

A few years before her death, she asked her daughter Soesja to write and sing a text for the theme from her Sonata for Cello and Piano but at the time it was too sacred to Soesja to handle. After she was gone, Soesja wrote “Song for Ma” in her memory. It is a jazz piece with an introductory verse referring to her cello theme.
Een spannende herleving van een gevoelige en complexe kunstenares
In deze opname brengt de pianist Marcel Worms het oeuvre van componiste en pianiste Agnes Jama ten gehore. Een album met haar complete oeuvre. Een soort muzikale nalatenschap en een spannende herleving van een gevoelige en complexe kunstenares. Als toegift bevat het album ook de Song voor Ma, van haar dochter jazz-zangeres Soesja Citroen.

Soesja Citroen: „Een paar jaar voor haar dood vroeg mijn moeder me het thema uit haar Cellosonate om te smeden tot een liedje. Dat kon ik toen niet, maar de melodie is wel in Song for Ma beland en een motiefje uit haar Sonatine gebruik ik ook. Mijn moeders muziek reflecteert haar persoonlijkheid. De kracht en de dynamiek van die Sonatine, met ijle motiefjes en dan flink uitpakken – zo was zij ook. Temperamentvol én spiritueel. Ja, Haagse sjiek, hè? Dat waren vaak ‘zweefkezen’." Mischa Spel, NRC, 20 oktober 2008.

Agnes werd geboren in 1911 in Dürnstein aan de Donau, niet ver van Wenen. Ze overleed in 1993 in Den Haag. Haar Nederlanderschap verkreeg ze in de jaren dertig. Haar vader was de Sloveense impressionistische schilder Matija Jama. En ook haar moeder, de Nederlandse jonkvrouwe Louise van Raders, was kunstschilder. Na het uitbreken van de Eerste Wereldoorlog vestigde het gezin Jama zich in Den Haag. Daar werden Agnes en haar zus Madeleine opgevoed in de Haagse kringen van haar moeder. Na de terugkeer van haar vader naar zijn geboorteplaats Ljubljana, bleef Agnes zo jong als ze was, via brieven contact met hem houden. Ze haalde haar HBS-diploma en het diploma middelbaar piano, waarna ze optrad als pianiste en in haar levensonderhoud voorzag door pianolessen te geven. Ze was getrouwd met Hans Citroen en kreeg een dochter: Soesja.

"De donkerharige vrouw met hoornen bril", zo omschreef een collega componist Agnes Jama eens. Ze was meer dan dat: artistiek, koppig, spiritueel, scherp en gastvrij. Maar bovenal werd ze gedreven door muziek. Of het nu ging om haar componeren, verzamelen van klassieke Westerse en etnische muziek, pianolessen, privé-concerten of schrijven over de pianotechniek, Agnes Jama leefde voor en door de muziek.

Agnes was een pianiste die vooral traditionele en impressionistische, maar soms ook Joegoslavische werken speelde. Ze stond open voor muziek uit alle hoeken van de wereld, overtuigd als ze ervan was, dat zulke muziek zou leiden tot een nieuwe kosmopolitische stijl. Ze zag er geen been in om publiekelijk kritiek te uiten op de steriele muziek van het naoorlogse tijdperk. Zij componeerde zo haar eigen melodieuze stukken, in de stijl van het romantisch impressionisme, iets wat in die tijd beslist geen mode was.

In de jaren ‘50 van de 20ste eeuw componeerde Agnes vier kamermuziekstukken: een Suite voor viool en piano, een Sonatina voor piano, een Sonate voor cello en piano en drie stukken voor zang en piano. Haar vijfde en laatste compositie onderscheidde zich duidelijk van de rest van haar kleine oeuvre. Ze maakte het in 1970 af: Vocatio voor mezzo-soprano, klarinet en piano. Daarmee toonde Agnes dat ze niet bang was om te experimenteren. Beïnvloed als ze leek door het experimentele tijdperk, waarin ze leefde en een cursus, die ze volgde van Ton de Leeuw, componist en muziekpedagoog. Onder de titel Actie, reactie en ontspanning bij het klavierspel, verscheen in 1989 haar pianomethode, waaraan ze jarenlang gewerkt heeft. De Hongaarse pianist en pedagoog Geörgy Sebök, prees de methode zelfs aan als studiemateriaal.

De Nederlander Marcel Worms (1951) nam het initiatief voor dit album met de complete muziek van Agnes Jama. Hij studeerde aan het Sweelinck Conservatorium in Amsterdam en volgde onder andere lessen bij de Russische pianist Youri Egorov. Na zijn eindexamen specialiseerde hij zich in kamermuziek en in 20ste-eeuwse pianomuziek. Worms is actief als kamermuziekspeler en als solist. Zijn 'Bluesproject', een programma waarvoor meer dan 200 Nederlandse en componisten overal ter wereld een bijdrage schreven, voerde hij wereldwijd uit.
Die Pianistin und Komponistin Agnes Jama wurde in Lubiljana geboren, verbrachte aber die größte Zeit ihres Lebens in den Niederlanden. Diese CD ist sozusagen ein klingendes Vermächtnis. Sie enthält alle von ihr zu Papier gebrachten Kompositionen, die deutlich Einflüsse von Bartok oder Messiaen zeigen. Eine spannende Wiederentdeckung einer sensiblen und vielschichtigen Künstlerin.

Artist(s)

Soesja Citroen

Soesja Citroen (singer/composer) has brought her music to Dutch and international stages for over 25 years. In recent years, she has been singing her own compositions with pianist Berend van den Berg and bassist Ruud Ouwehand. She was born in The Hague, was raised with classical music and as a teenager started to sing jazz. After completing her Master’s in social psychology, she opted for jazz and took voice and piano lessons. She has performed in many European countries, played at the Yatra Jazz Festival in India, sung in New York and toured though Indonesia. After making three LP’s with, among others, Nedly Elstak, Willem Breuker and Nico Bunink, she recorded her album Soesja Citroen sings Thelonious Monk in 1983 with Cees...
more
Soesja Citroen (singer/composer) has brought her music to Dutch and international stages for over 25 years. In recent years, she has been singing her own compositions with pianist Berend van den Berg and bassist Ruud Ouwehand. She was born in The Hague, was raised with classical music and as a teenager started to sing jazz. After completing her Master’s in social psychology, she opted for jazz and took voice and piano lessons.
She has performed in many European countries, played at the Yatra Jazz Festival in India, sung in New York and toured though Indonesia.
After making three LP’s with, among others, Nedly Elstak, Willem Breuker and Nico Bunink, she recorded her album Soesja Citroen sings Thelonious Monk in 1983 with Cees Slinger. On this CD, she herself supplied the texts for five Monk compositions.
Between 1984 and 1989 she recorded three albums with the Metropole Orchestra under the direction of Rogier van Otterloo and Robert Farnon. Fifteen of these pieces appear on the compilation CD Yesterdays (1998, CHR70049).
Beginning in 1994, she made her two first CD’s for Challenge Jazz with songs from the American songbook. With reference to the CD Songs for Lovers and Losers (1996, CHR70034), Alex Henderson of All Music Guide wrote, “very soulful phrasing” and “moving and personal interpretations of standards such as Angel Eyes and Lush Life.” The turning point of her career came when she began composing at the age of 48.
Her last three CD’s, Song for Ma (1998, CHR70056), Soesja sings Citroen (2001, CHR70101) and Don’t Cry Baby (2005, CHR70127) contain 40 of her own compositions, both music and text. She received a lot of feedback from the United States, the country whose song tradition Soesja elaborates on with her pieces.
In Jazz Times, she was called “absolutely sensational” and a “formidable composer.” In the Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD from 2004, her Monk CD received 4 stars and her song Song for Ma was called “magnificent.” In the newly released book Jazz Singers: The Top 500 by Scott Yanow she is described as one of the top five hundred vocalists in the world.

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Marcel Worms

Dutch pianist Marcel Worms (1951) studied at the Sweelinck Conservatorium in Amsterdam with Hans Dercksen. After his graduation in 1987, he continued his studies with Alexandre Hrisanide and Hans Broekman, specialising in 20th Century piano music and in chamber music. He took also private lessons with the Russian pianist Yuri Egorov. On the occasion of the centenary (1992) of Darius Milhaud's birthday, Marcel Worms founded the Ensemble Polytonal, which Ensemble performed in an all-Milhaud program in Holland and France in that year. He premiered early piano works of Arnold Schoenberg in the Icebreaker, centre of modern music in Amsterdam. He performed the complete piano works of Leos Janácek (including a four-hand piece, that he discovered in Brno). His programme Jazz in 20th-Century...
more
Dutch pianist Marcel Worms (1951) studied at the Sweelinck Conservatorium in Amsterdam with Hans Dercksen. After his graduation in 1987, he continued his studies with Alexandre Hrisanide and Hans Broekman, specialising in 20th Century piano music and in chamber music. He took also private lessons with the Russian pianist Yuri Egorov.
On the occasion of the centenary (1992) of Darius Milhaud's birthday, Marcel Worms founded the Ensemble Polytonal, which Ensemble performed in an all-Milhaud program in Holland and France in that year.
He premiered early piano works of Arnold Schoenberg in the Icebreaker, centre of modern music in Amsterdam. He performed the complete piano works of Leos Janácek (including a four-hand piece, that he discovered in Brno). His programme Jazz in 20th-Century Piano Music, launched in the 1992/93 Season, was broadcast nation-wide by Dutch radio. It was subsequently released on CD by the Dutch label BVHAAST. As a result Marcel Worms was invited to play this programme in many European countries, North America, Russia, South-Africa and Indonesia. He launched this programme in New York and Washington DC in 1994 and returned to the US for recitals since then almost every year.
In the Season 1994/95 Marcel Worms started a programme titled Mondrian and the music of his time to commemorate Mondrian's death, 50 years ago. Several composers, including Willem Breuker and Theo Loevendie had been commissioned to write for it . This programme was played in many European countries and the USA. About the concert in the National Gallery of Art in Washington the Washington Post wrote: "All this was virtuoso fare and Worms played it with joy, grace and, at times, humour that was contagious and captivating." In 1996 he played this program in the Hermitage Theatre in St.Petersburg, in the Pushkin Museum in Moscow. A CD of the program has been released for Emergo Classics.
A CD with the complete music for piano and wind instruments by Francis Poulenc has been released also on the label Emergo Classics. A CD with piano music by Jean Wiéner has been released in 1996 for the BVHAAST label.
His programme 'Blues for piano' to which many well-known Dutch composers contributed with a piece has been premeried in January 1997 at the BIMHUIS, jazz centre in Amsterdam. In the meantime some 170 new Blues pieces have been composed for this project including pieces from around 50 different countries around the world. He played the programme at the Moscow Conservatory in 1997 and at the Conservatories of Beijing and Shanghai in 1998. In 1999 he played it at the North Sea Jazz Festival in the Hague, in 2000 at the Festival of Flandria, in 2001 at the Warsaw Autumn Festival and in 2002 at the EU Jazz Festival in Mexico City. In 2004 the program was presented at the Fajr Festival in Iran and in 2005 at the ‘Tbilisi Autumn Festival’ in Georgia. In 2008 he played at the Internatial Piano Festival of Bucaramanga (Colombia). In 2009 he gave concerts in a.o. Uganda and Sudan and also in 2010 he will perform there and in several other African countries. The project has so far been recorded on 4 CD’s.
In 2000 he played his Bluesprogram in all the countries of the Balcan. Composers from all of these countries wrote a contribution for this tour.
In the 1998-1999 season the artist has focused on Vincent van Gogh and Pablo Picasso and their relation to music. Both projects have resulted in a CD recording.
Between 1998 and 2008 concerts have been given by Marcel Worms in many European countries, South-America, South-Africa, Israel, China, Cuba, the United States and the Far East.
The artist is a regular guest on Dutch radio.
Since 2002 Marcel Worms focusses a.o. on the pianoworks of the Spanish composer Federico Mompou. In 2007 he organised a 3 days Mompou Festival in his hometown Amsterdam, that has been completely broadcasted by Dutch radio. In 2009 he released a cd with unpublished works for piano by Mompou, that had been discovered in Barcelona in 2008. He is the first pianist to have released these works on cd.
A tango program, which was performed a.o. in China and Argentina, resulted in a CD with Tangos for Piano in 2002. With flutist Eleonore Pameijer he is working on their 'Six Continents Project' in the Netherlands and abroad. For this project composers from all the 6 Continents wrote a piece in which they expressed their cultural identity. The program has been performed in many European countries, in the USA, Israël and India and it has been released on CD on the occasion of UNESCO’s 60th Anniversary.
A CD by the duo with works by dutch, jewish composers, persecuted by the nazi’s, has been released in 2005.
Since 2006 he has a musical partnership with violinist Ursula Schoch, subsitute concertmaster of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra.

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Helena Rasker

The Dutch alto HELENA RASKER (Paula) studied at the Royal Conservatoire in The Hague and at the Tanglewood Music Center in the US. Helena Rasker has worked with conductors like Marc Minkowski, Fabio Biondi, Michael Corboz, Pascal Rophé, Hartmut Haenchen, Paolo Carignani, Jonathan Stockhammer Christian Zacharias, Oliver Knussen, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Reinbert de Leeuw and Jaap van Zweden, with orchestras like Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra, London Sinfonietta, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Les Musiciens du Louvre Grenoble, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France and Bamberger Symphoniker. Her repertoire includes oratorios by Bach, Händel, Mendelssohn, Mozart and Dvořák, song cycles and symphonies by Mahler, Shostakovich, Wagner and Frank Martin, as well as chamber music by Ravel, Brahms, Britten, Ligeti, Sciarrino, Nono and Gubaidulina....
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The Dutch alto HELENA RASKER (Paula) studied at the Royal Conservatoire in The Hague and at the Tanglewood Music Center in the US. Helena Rasker has worked with conductors like Marc Minkowski, Fabio Biondi, Michael Corboz, Pascal Rophé, Hartmut Haenchen, Paolo Carignani, Jonathan Stockhammer Christian Zacharias, Oliver Knussen, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Reinbert de Leeuw and Jaap van Zweden, with orchestras like Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra, London Sinfonietta, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Les Musiciens du Louvre Grenoble, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France and Bamberger Symphoniker. Her repertoire includes oratorios by Bach, Händel, Mendelssohn, Mozart and Dvořák, song cycles and symphonies by Mahler, Shostakovich, Wagner and Frank Martin, as well as chamber music by Ravel, Brahms, Britten, Ligeti, Sciarrino, Nono and Gubaidulina. Her opera repertoire includes roles in Orfeo ed Euridice, Dritte Dame in Die Zauberflöte, Irene in Theodora and La Furie in Van Vlijmen’s Thyeste. With Dutch National Opera, she has sung in Moses und Aron, Rêves d’un Marco Polo, After Life, Adam in Ballingschap, Legende, Elektra, Guillaume Tell, Die Walküre and Laika.

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Composer(s)

Soesja Citroen

Soesja Citroen (singer/composer) has brought her music to Dutch and international stages for over 25 years. In recent years, she has been singing her own compositions with pianist Berend van den Berg and bassist Ruud Ouwehand. She was born in The Hague, was raised with classical music and as a teenager started to sing jazz. After completing her Master’s in social psychology, she opted for jazz and took voice and piano lessons. She has performed in many European countries, played at the Yatra Jazz Festival in India, sung in New York and toured though Indonesia. After making three LP’s with, among others, Nedly Elstak, Willem Breuker and Nico Bunink, she recorded her album Soesja Citroen sings Thelonious Monk in 1983 with Cees...
more
Soesja Citroen (singer/composer) has brought her music to Dutch and international stages for over 25 years. In recent years, she has been singing her own compositions with pianist Berend van den Berg and bassist Ruud Ouwehand. She was born in The Hague, was raised with classical music and as a teenager started to sing jazz. After completing her Master’s in social psychology, she opted for jazz and took voice and piano lessons.
She has performed in many European countries, played at the Yatra Jazz Festival in India, sung in New York and toured though Indonesia.
After making three LP’s with, among others, Nedly Elstak, Willem Breuker and Nico Bunink, she recorded her album Soesja Citroen sings Thelonious Monk in 1983 with Cees Slinger. On this CD, she herself supplied the texts for five Monk compositions.
Between 1984 and 1989 she recorded three albums with the Metropole Orchestra under the direction of Rogier van Otterloo and Robert Farnon. Fifteen of these pieces appear on the compilation CD Yesterdays (1998, CHR70049).
Beginning in 1994, she made her two first CD’s for Challenge Jazz with songs from the American songbook. With reference to the CD Songs for Lovers and Losers (1996, CHR70034), Alex Henderson of All Music Guide wrote, “very soulful phrasing” and “moving and personal interpretations of standards such as Angel Eyes and Lush Life.” The turning point of her career came when she began composing at the age of 48.
Her last three CD’s, Song for Ma (1998, CHR70056), Soesja sings Citroen (2001, CHR70101) and Don’t Cry Baby (2005, CHR70127) contain 40 of her own compositions, both music and text. She received a lot of feedback from the United States, the country whose song tradition Soesja elaborates on with her pieces.
In Jazz Times, she was called “absolutely sensational” and a “formidable composer.” In the Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD from 2004, her Monk CD received 4 stars and her song Song for Ma was called “magnificent.” In the newly released book Jazz Singers: The Top 500 by Scott Yanow she is described as one of the top five hundred vocalists in the world.

less

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