Jozef van Wissem is an avant-garde composer and lutenist playing his all black, one-of-a-kind custom-made baroque lute all around the world. The titles and the nature of his works often have a Christian-mystical appeal and the music he creates is simply timeless. In 2013 van Wissem won the Cannes Soundtrack Award at the Cannes Film Festival for Jim Jarmusch's Only Lovers Left Alive. In December 2017 Jozef van Wissem was invited to perform the madrigal depicted in Caravaggio's painting The Lute Player (1596) at the Hermitage museum of Saint Petersburg. An autodidactic author, a Renaissance talent in the cruelty of the 21st century, who switched the intense lifestyle of a new wave artist and bar owner from Groningen to a modern-age thinker who studied lute in New York, and later became one of the most influential contemporary songwriters, known for his solo and cinematic works. Van Wissem has earned much critical acclaim for his work, the "liberation of the lute" as he calls it. According to the New York times Van Wissem is "both an avantgarde composer and a baroque lutenist, and thus no stranger to dichotomy". According to The Quietus "Van Wissem is possibly the best know lute player in the western world. To get into van Jozef Van Wissem's world is to surrender to the inevitability -- and timelessness -- of a strange music created at its own pace, in a manner wholly of its creator's making. He sets the listener into a private world, looking out through a glass darkly, such is the intense quality of the music. Brevity, simplicity, directness is the key." His completely unique musical world can be easily verified by his collaborations, especially that these relationships are also strengthening his own musical character. He worked together with Zola Jesus, Tilda Swinton, Jarboe as well as with his long-time collaborative partner, also his friend, Jim Jarmusch. The timeless value of his work can be described by one of his previous interviews: "... the lute goes against all technology and against all computers and against all the shit you don't need." While, at the same time, no matter if we're talking about his cinematic works, remarkable collaborations or his own full-lengths, the honest, pure, yet frightfully peccable sound of Jozef van Wissem can always remind us to our true selves, and also our deepest fears.
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INC 034CD
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Dutch lute player and composer Jozef Van Wissem presents his album The Night Dwells in the Day. The ability to constantly extract something different and explore fresh terrain is evident throughout Van Wissem's sprawling back catalogue and up to his latest album, The Night Dwells in the Day. Over the years he's released countless solo albums stretching into double figures, there's been collaborations with Jim Jarmusch and Tilda Swinton, award-winning computer game soundtracks, along with award-winning film soundtracks, from Jarmusch's Only Lovers Left Alive to Pierre Creton's 2023 film A Prince. The genesis for his latest album began during lockdown in Warsaw, where Van Wissem splits his time between Rotterdam. "The Call of the Deathbird" was the first song he wrote from the album and is the first to be shared. One of the relatively rare tracks that Van Wissem sings on -- along with some stirring and enveloping guest vocals from Hilary Woods -- his towering voice circles above the music much like the swooping deathbird he sings of. Normally Van Wissem writes all the music for one album within a confined period but this one song from a few years ago stuck around and took on a new lease of life and so joined a bunch of freshly written songs for the album.
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INC 033LP
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LP version. Dutch lute player and composer Jozef Van Wissem presents his album The Night Dwells in the Day. The ability to constantly extract something different and explore fresh terrain is evident throughout Van Wissem's sprawling back catalogue and up to his latest album, The Night Dwells in the Day. Over the years he's released countless solo albums stretching into double figures, there's been collaborations with Jim Jarmusch and Tilda Swinton, award-winning computer game soundtracks, along with award-winning film soundtracks, from Jarmusch's Only Lovers Left Alive to Pierre Creton's 2023 film A Prince. The genesis for his latest album began during lockdown in Warsaw, where Van Wissem splits his time between Rotterdam. "The Call of the Deathbird" was the first song he wrote from the album and is the first to be shared. One of the relatively rare tracks that Van Wissem sings on -- along with some stirring and enveloping guest vocals from Hilary Woods -- his towering voice circles above the music much like the swooping deathbird he sings of. Normally Van Wissem writes all the music for one album within a confined period but this one song from a few years ago stuck around and took on a new lease of life and so joined a bunch of freshly written songs for the album.
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INC 029CD
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Jozef Van Wissem: "In 2019 I was commissioned by Cinémathèque Française in Paris to compose the soundtrack to the restored original version of the Nosferatu film (1922). When I was writing the score, I found a Dutch double 7" record with sounds of extinct birds on the streets of Rotterdam. I manipulated these found bird sounds by using electronics and added them to the score." Personnel: Jozef Van Wissem - lute, electronics, beats, electric guitar, found bird sounds.
"Beginning with a lute solo, his soundtrack incorporates electric guitar and distorted recordings of extinct birds, graduating from subtlety to gothic horror. 'My soundtrack goes from silence to noise over the course of 90 minutes,' he said, culminating in 'dense, slow death metal.'" --The New York Times
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INC 030LP
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LP version. Jozef Van Wissem: "In 2019 I was commissioned by Cinémathèque Française in Paris to compose the soundtrack to the restored original version of the Nosferatu film (1922). When I was writing the score, I found a Dutch double 7" record with sounds of extinct birds on the streets of Rotterdam. I manipulated these found bird sounds by using electronics and added them to the score." Personnel: Jozef Van Wissem - lute, electronics, beats, electric guitar, found bird sounds.
"Beginning with a lute solo, his soundtrack incorporates electric guitar and distorted recordings of extinct birds, graduating from subtlety to gothic horror. 'My soundtrack goes from silence to noise over the course of 90 minutes,' he said, culminating in 'dense, slow death metal.'" --The New York Times
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INC 027CD
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Behold! I Make All Things New is all instrumental and consists of sparse works for lute and electronics. There are no vocals. It is more a return to the minimal neo-classical style of Jozef Van Wissem's early work. Written and recorded in lockdown in Warsaw and Rotterdam between 2019 and 2021. Van Wissem lived in Brooklyn since the early nineties. He left New York because of Trump's immigration policies. There was no need for singing. Personnel: Jozef Van Wissem- lute, electronics. CD version includes one bonus track.
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INC 028LP
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LP version. Behold! I Make All Things New is all instrumental and consists of sparse works for lute and electronics. There are no vocals. It is more a return to the minimal neo-classical style of Jozef Van Wissem's early work. Written and recorded in lockdown in Warsaw and Rotterdam between 2019 and 2021. Van Wissem lived in Brooklyn since the early nineties. He left New York because of Trump's immigration policies. There was no need for singing. Personnel: Jozef Van Wissem- lute, electronics.
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INC 023LP
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2017 release. Recorded live in Prague in February 2017. Includes pieces for film like "Only Lovers Left Alive", "Sola Gratia", and "Our Hearts Condemn Us", as well as songs like "Detachment", "The Day Is Coming", and "Love Destroys All Evil". Personnel: Jozef van Wissem - lute, voice. Artwork by Sergey Marinichev. Limited edition, silver on black silk screen printed cover.
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IMPREC 379CD
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"Gorgeous full length from Dutch lutenist Jozef Van Wissem. Wissem's long form, graceful melodic lute layers, preceded by suspenseful deep bass movements, create a transcendental and pastoral. Wissem's is a world where hypnotic minimalist figures are repeated to slow the act of listening. Nihil Obstat ('Nothing Hinders') is performed on Wissem's custom black lute built by Michael Schreiner. The CD version of Nihil Obstat includes an extended 11 minute version."
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IMPREC 379LP
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LP version pressed in an edition of 800.
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INC 009CD
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2008 release. Liner notes by David Tibet:
"Once some music dropped through my letter-box; let's summon their sounds into our world now, and deliver their names as Roses or Stations. The picture they imagined was both clear and cryptic: the certainties of the 17th century holding tight the ugly beauty that we now see scattered around us. I loved these CDs by Jozef van Wissem, A Rose By Any Other Name and Stations Of The Cross. And then I received a new album, A Priori, and I immediately played it and heard its stark and repetitive intensity, its stately and glacial march. There is nothing quite like it that I have heard before -- it is timeless, breathing deeply and exhaling showers of snow, endless circles, mirrors, spirals, the sea. When Jozef plays the lute, he pours out endless space. What can I say but let the rain come, close your eyes and watch the stars fall and rise and fall again."
"Something has been slowly happening to the perception of lutes, over the past five years or so the instrument has received a kind of popular culture pardon. Jozef van Wissem has been more of a sniper in this battle rather than a braying officer, his releases finding their mark and word spreading of his undoubted skill. A Priori is the most complete example yet of this Renaissance-tagged instrument embracing timelessness. His minimalist playing may be a taint to those who prefer whippersnappers offering rippling runs of notes, to those accustomed to listen till they became surfeited, but van Wissem plays with a tender surety. There is a Satie-like feel to the melody on 'Aerumna,' the sharp strings announcing the notes like sundial chimes. His use of musical palindromes, instead of tying the pieces to form, makes his music seem instead like long, gentle arcs of endless recurring melody. (8/10) --Scott McKeating, Foxy Digitalis
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IMPREC 329CD
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"From acclaimed contemporary composer & Lutenis Jozef Van Wissem. Included among these palindromic trance pieces are new compositions are contributions from film maker Jim Jarmusch and vocalist Jeanne Madic. CD version includes a bonus track. Between the CD & LP are split a pair of pieces working in the theme of maternity/paternity. The Joy that Never Ends offers endless cinematic repetition of tortuously minimal beauty in five layered mirror image compositions from the sublime master of the lute, Jozef Van Wissem. Unlike his last album, Ex Patris, Wissem is not alone. Featured here are waves of subtle guitar feedback meandering from the amplifier of filmmaker Jim Jarmusch & vocals from Jeanne Madic."
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IMPREC 329LP
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LP pressed in an edition of 500.
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IMPREC 267CD
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"The title Ex Patris ('from the fathers') plays on the idiomatic baroque lute compositions presented here which emulate the classical repertoire. It also refers to this almost forgotten instrument, which was passed on by the fathers. The aim is to bring back and liberate the lute. Composer-lute player Jozef Van Wissem is renowned for his unusual approach of the Renaissance and Baroque lute. He cuts and pastes classical pieces, reverses melodies, adds electronics and processed field recordings made at airport lounges and train stations. The unusual wedlock of composition and improvisation creates an unheard amalgam of contemporary folk and late Renaissance music. He has accomplished the strange feat of bridging the idiom of seventeenth century lute literature and twenty-first century composition. Although Van Wissem uses subtle electronic sound manipulation, he has largely stayed faithful to the particular timbre, resonance and playing technique of the lute. Van Wissem first came to be noticed a few years ago because of his radical conceptual approach to Renaissance lute music: he deconstructed existing compositions, for instance, by playing them backwards. He also composes his own pieces for lute, using palindromes and mirrored structures. His music therefore does not have a traditional linear progression, nor leads to a climax, it rather stays on the same level of intensity. His music is quiet and not so much demands concentrated listening, as it will bring the listener in a state of concentrated listening."
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IMPREC 267LP
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Limited to 500 copies. "The title Ex Patris ('From The Fathers') plays on the idiomatic baroque lute compositions presented here which emulate the classical repertoire. It also refers to this almost forgotten instrument, which was passed on by the fathers. The aim is to bring back and liberate the lute. The four compositions on Ex Patris form a circular narrative of interlocking repetitive melodic series. The follow up to Important release It Is All That Is Made kicks off with the pro apocalyptic track 'The Day is Coming.' 'Amor Fati' ('Love Is A Religion') channels a deep interest in both love for religion and religious belief in love. Multiple palindromes are juxtaposed and linger. 'Son of Dawn' consists of mirrored lute harmonics that serve as an intro to the 13 minute elegiac 'After The Fire Has Devoured All It Will Consume Itself.' The piece builds and releases tension and puts layer upon layer of ecstatic melody. At the end even the work itself gets devoured but it remains eternal, with no potential beginning and without end."
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IMPREC 232CD
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"Brand new full length comprised of six compositions from acclaimed lutenist and James Blackshaw Brethren Of The Free Spirit bandmate Jozef Van Wissem. It Is All That Is Made consists of six trance-inducing circular pieces composed for 10 course renaissance -- and 13 course baroque lute. The titles of the pieces and the storyline critically juxtapose the first chapter of Genesis with more contemporary narratives. This evokes a parallel to the mixing of idiomatic classical lute material of the 17th century with modern folk and avantgarde music. The pieces are played forward, then backward, creating music that is potentially without beginning or end. It Is All That Is Made consists of recurring minimal themes emphasizing the listening experience. The photograph on the front cover was taken during a Portuguese festival last summer outside on the museum steps performing for a large crowd without any amplification or artificial light in true cinematic dogma style. Composer-lute player Jozef Van Wissem is renowned for his unusual approach to the Renaissance and Baroque lute, probably the most unlikely instruments in the world of contemporary music. He cuts and pastes classical pieces, reverses melodies, adds electronics and processed field recordings made in airport lounges and train stations. The unusual wedlock of composition and improvisation creates an unheard amalgam of contemporary folk and early music. Van Wissem has accomplished the strange feat of bridging the idiom of seventeenth century lute literature and twenty-first century contemporary music. Although he uses subtle electronic sound manipulation, he has largely stayed faithful to the particular timbre, resonance and playing technique of the lute. Van Wissem first came to be noticed a few years ago because of his radical conceptual approach to Renaissance lute music: He deconstructed existing compositions, for instance, by playing them backwards. He also composed his own pieces for lute, using palindromes and mirrored structures. His music therefore does not have a traditional linear progression, nor leads to a climax, it rather stays on the same level of intensity. His music not so much demands concentrated listening, as it brings the listener in a state of concentrated listening. He performs extensively around the world. He also works with the likes of Maurizio Bianchi, James Blackshaw and Tetuzi Akiyama. With Blackshaw, he formed the duo Brethren of the Free Spirit. Van Wissem lectures, as well, on composing for and improvising on the lute."
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INC 004CD
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"New release from baroque conceptualist and improviser, Jozef Van Wissem, who, for more than a decade, has been quietly but surely reinventing the vocabulary of that most unlikely of instruments, the lute. With the exception of the odd Renaissance preservationist context, the lute, which was once the most popular portable instrument in the Western world, has all but disappeared from our musical landscape. Despite the arcane associations of his chosen instrument, Van Wissem is no revivalist; his compositions often marry a deep and self-conscious knowledge of the instrument's weighty history with a rigorous post-modern sensibility that has encompassed everything from appropriation to minimalist free improvisation, electronic manipulation, and the mirrored or palindrome musical structures for which he is perhaps best known. These palindrome compositions, a group of which are collected on Stations Of The Cross, are compositions that, like the words 'radar' or 'wow,' or the phrase, 'Madam, I'm Adam,' read the same forwards or backwards. Each composition progresses through a series of notes to the midpoint of the piece, where the sequence then reverses and the pitches are played in retrograde order back to the composition's starting point. The effect is strange and subtle, and oddly psychological -- there is a sense that time expands and contracts back to the point of origin, while the exact moment of reversal is difficult to detect. Compositional expectations are similarly, subtly undercut and, being that the beginning is always also the end, these pieces tend to come to a close without resolution, which gives them a quietly unsettling, question-like quality. To make things even more interesting, these mirrored structures are often superimposed onto field recordings of airport terminal interiors which are digitally manipulated into mirrored structures of their own. These recordings lend an eerie, impersonal atmosphere, the specificity and contemporary nature of which stands in stark contrast to the timeless, esoteric quality of Van Wissem's gut stringed lutes. Stations is a record of quiet, stately beauty and concept."
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BVHAAST 0905
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First solo release by Van Wissem on Bvhaast, 2005 release. Performed by Jozef van Wissem (lute, airfield recordings, electronics), Arnold Marinissen (palindrome percussion on track 7). "Though Van Wissem draws inspiration from Renaissance period forms, the use of computer-edited airport recordings fixes these pieces firmly in the now, and his approach to the lute is such that this CD would not be out of place in the John Fahey section of your music collection. Dreamy, oblique and minimal, the music insinuates itself into the listener's mind like a subliminal message or an overheard snippet of conversation." --Pete Gershon, Signal to Noise
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