Greetje Bijma

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Greetje Bijma (born April 22, 1956 in Stiens near Leeuwarden , province of Friesland ) is a Dutch (jazz) singer and band leader.

Life and work

Bijma initially worked as a kindergarten teacher. In the late 1970s she began to sing songs to the guitar in front of a small audience, until an encounter with the pianist and composer Harry de Wit inspired her to consistently expand her vocal possibilities experimentally. In 1979 she took part in the competition at the Laren Jazz Festival. In the following year, saxophonist and composer Alan Laurillard , who comes from Canada and lives in the Netherlands, became aware of them and won them over to his Improvised Music Ensemble . With Bijma as the singer, Laurillard soon afterwards founded the Noodband , sometimes referred to as the “punk jazz” group , whose peculiar line-up - two alto saxophones, two bass guitars, two drums - refers to their experimental character, but whose own note was largely influenced by Bijma's vocal improvisations (Appearance at the Moers Festival 1982).

After she - again with Laurillard as composer and arranger - founded Greetje Bijma Kwintet in 1984 and released her first album under her own name, Amycamus , in 1986 , she was not only in demand in the jazz scene, but also in rock music and theater . Their second album has already been produced by Kunle Mwanga, the manager and producer of David Murray . In 1989 she went on tour with the vocal quintet Direct Sound of the US singer and drummer David Moss and in the same year achieved her artistic breakthrough at the JazzFest Berlin in the Berlin Philharmonie .

At the end of 1990 Bijma was the first woman to be honored with the Boy Edgar Prize , the most prestigious award for jazz musicians in the Netherlands. In 1991 the Dutch “Duke of Duketown” award followed; In 1992 she received the “ Prix ​​Italia ” for her collaboration with the Dutch composer and pianist Louis Andriessen . When Antwerp was European Capital of Culture in 1993, she developed a special program for children as part of the festive events. In 1993 she performed with Christoph Haberer's Drümmele Maa at the Münster Jazz Festival. From 1994 she became part of the experimental jazz trio Freezing Screens with the Dutch keyboardist Jasper van't Hof and the Swiss drummer Pierre Favre . The resounding success of this trio at the Donaueschinger Musiktage made Bijma known throughout Europe.

Her work with the composer, saxophonist and clarinetist Bernd Konrad began in 1998 in his composition "Red Shoes", a musical processing of the life of Janis Joplin , and continued in 2004 in the Konrad composition "Stepping Stone - I Have a Dream", a tribute to Martin Luther King, Jr. , based on his speech from 1963.

Greetje Bijma worked mainly in solo programs in the early years of the new millennium, but occasionally appeared with the Dutch organist Klaas Hoek and with the Willem Breuker Kollektief . In the 2010s she could also be seen in productions by Jacob Lekkerkerker , but also in BRISK & Bijma , an improvisation project with the four recorder players of the BRISK Recorder Quartet , in Mark Timmer's musical theater Oude Wind & Harde Noten with Guus Janssen and Wolter Wierbos as well as with the Greetje Bijma Kwintet.

Stylistic peculiarities

The singer's vocal style is characterized by an enormous vocal range and a particularly accentuated use of the voice as an instrument (cf. Scat or Bop vocals). From the constant change of intonations and phrasing as well as different timbres , the mixture of cantilènes and creaking or cooing noises with overtone singing , a confusingly diverse soundscape of strong tension emerges , which is not only shown to advantage in solo performances but also in ensemble play comes without dominating the fellow musicians.

Discographic notes

  • 1986 Amycamus
  • 1988 Dark Moves
  • 1991 Shiver
  • 1991 Tales of a Voice (re-released 1998)
  • 1993 Barefoot (re-released 1999)
  • 1996 Freezing Screens
  • 2004 sit down lists ...
  • 2019 Greetje Bijma / Nora Mulder / Mary Oliver : Picatrix

literature

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Bijma, Greetje
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Dutch singer
DATE OF BIRTH April 22, 1956
PLACE OF BIRTH Stiens near Leeuwarden