Margriet Hoenderdos

2015 release **

"Margriet Hoenderdos, a student of influential Dutch composer Ton de Leeuw, was still honing her own distinctive voice at the time of her premature death in 2010. The precariousness of simply existing is effectively evoked in a 21 minute woodwind quintet in which she responded to a poem by Hans Faverey, written as he endured his own terminal illness. Sombre and harmonically anxious, this music resembles a physical construction that appears sturdy, yet has an unnerving tendency to wobble and slip. Maart ’98, a string quartet composed eight years later, relies upon uncoordinated glissandi of varying speeds. They leave the ear unsure whether a subtly coloured and delicate twine is taking form or steadily unravelling. Eight years further down the line Hoenderos composed Juli ’06, inspired by a poem her partner Bas Geerts wrote in reaction to belligerent rhetoric issuing from the White House. Scored for unaccompanied soprano voice, it is clearly a challenging work to perform, and by no means a comfortable listen. Singer Margo Rens meticulously observes its destabilising gradations of vibrato. Unsettling music, by a composer who deserves to be remembered.