Diversity of opinion about a work of art shows that the work is new, complex and vital.
When critics disagree the artist is in accord with himself.

– Oscar Wilde

nasa

nasa is a new and unique creative initiative recently begun by musicians Sarah Jeffery and Nadja Spooren. By combining the unusual sounds of the bass panflute, contrabass 'paetzold' recorder, percussive clogs and electronics, they aim to break boundaries and inspire new repertoire for these burgeoning instruments of the 21st century.

Sarah and Nadja met whilst studying contemporary music at the Conservatorium van Amsterdam, where they were inspired by south indian karnatic music, max/msp, and contemporary improvisation.

This musical setting is as yet unheard of, yet is a collaboration that represents a valuable place in the futures of both instruments. nasa is currently working with composers in order to create a diverse repertoire, exploring the vast sound palette and creative possibilities offered. Ideas and submissions from collaborators/composers are therefore welcomed at this time, to be debuted in a series of concerts through the netherlands in the winter of 2011.

The Amsterdam Panflute Ensemble

While studying at the Conservatorium van Amsterdam, all panflute students join this ensemble. They play old and new music, to stimulate both harmonic and atonal hearing. Ensemble playing in general encourages musicality and stimulates a different attitude from solo playing. Next to the standard alto flutes, the ensemble makes use of the bass panflute to encompass a bigger range.

Apart from the regular rehearsals, there are also yearly projects during which the players work with other musicians and/or composers, to enlarge their experience and to ensure a steady growth of the available repertoire.

At the moment the ensemble is a trio, with the players Thera de Zwart, Nadja Spooren and Henske van der Weerd. They are currently working on a concert programme with old music by Thomas Morley, John Wilbye, and Joachim Quantz a.o., and contemporary music written for this particular instrumentation by André Douw, Chiel Meijering and Hugo Harmens. The planned concerts can be found in the concert agenda of this website.

Thera de Zwart
Thera (*1991) began playing the panflute at the age of eight. Until a year ago, she mainly focussed on traditional folk music and classical repertoire, but since the start of her studies at the Conservatorium van Amsterdam, she has become acquainted with Renaissance music and contemporary repertoire for panflute. These intrigue her, as the sound of the panflute turns out to be very well suited for playing old music, and the new repertoire brings out special and interesting aspects of the instrument.
Thera is currently in the preliminary year of her fulltime education. She is literally and figuratively the youngest member of the Amsterdam Panflute Ensemble and is acquiring a lot of experience in the field of ensemble playing in different style periods.

Nadja Spooren
Nadja (*1983) started playing the panflute when she was fourteen years old. Though her love for music – and more particularly, the instrument – were strong enough to make a job out of it, a fulltime education was not available. Therefore, she took a different route. She graduated from the Radboud University of Nijmegen in 2005, where she studied English literature.
In that same year, the fulltime studies of panflute started at the Conservatorium van Amsterdam with Matthijs Koene as main teacher and Jorge Isaac as her coach, and in 2010 she successfully finished her education there with an outspoken interest for contemporary ensemble music and education. She now teaches at music school De Plantage and is busy with her own practise in Wijchen, near Nijmegen (NL). She also forms the duo Agalma with guitarist Maarten Schumacher, with whom she plays contemporary and traditional Romanian music.

Henske van der Weerd
Henske (*1987) began her panflute lessons at the age of twelve with Gerard Rijken van Olst, at the musicschool of Kampen (NL). She continued her studies at the conservatory of Zwolle, where she followed three years of the Teacher of Music education with panflute lessons by Liselotte Rokyta, before deciding to change to the fulltime panflute studies in Amsterdam with Matthijs Koene. She is currently preparing her final, which will take place in June 2011.
She has also taken part in several masterclasses, by Nicolae Pirvu and Michel Tirabosco among others. Henske teaches at different music school in the Netherlands and gives regular concerts. Since her studies she concentrates on playing both classical and contemporary repertoire on the panflute; for this, she works with composers to ensure an increase of contemporary repertoire.