René Van Der Wouden

René van der Wouden (February 10 1972) has been active in music since he was eight years old.

He started having piano lessons in a classical sense and later he also had some lessons on the organ. As a child René quickly got fascinated by the organs and synthesizers he saw on tv every week in the Dutch musicshows Toppop and Countdown. Also, his piano teacher of that time (in 1983) played a Roland Jupiter 6 synthesizer in a band. During a lesson this synthesizer stood next to the piano that remained untouched that day. Since 1987 the interest in electronic music started to grow immensely. The music of Jean Michel Jarre, Vangelis, Tangerine Dream and Jeff Wayne's “War Of The Worlds” got his interest.

In 1993 René bought his first set of two cheap synthesizers like the Korg Poly800 and Yamaha DX7. During this period René started to compose and record many pieces of music. Also an expanse of more electronic instruments and recording-devices happened.

Next to music René has always had interest in art. Especially the works of Salvador Dali, René Magritte and Joan Miro inspires him to compose electronic music and design grafical computer arts. Also the works of Antoni Gaudi gave him his interest in art and design.

"Pro Sequentia", the debut CD, was released first on the German Syng@te label on April 16 2005. Because of different visions Syng@te and René departed in May 2005. René decided to release "Pro Sequentia" as an independent. This is the first Private RvdW CD release. The cd has been well received all over the EM-world. The music can be described as retro/Berliner Schule with contemporary elements. On this album analogue and digital synthesizers were used together will all the power and comfort of the Cubase DAW and Logic DAW programs.

The concert at E-Live 2005 was the first fully electronic concert. E-Live 2005 sub-stage concert consisted of 3 sets. The first set was in the style of the "Pro Sequentia" album, the second set consisted of 2 tracks of AMBIENT music and the last set/concert took place together with the most successful Dutch musician of electronic music today, Gert Emmens. The music was recorded for personal documentation and will not be released.

In 2006 the follow up-CD of "Pro Sequentia" was released on the 21 September 2006 as "Alchemia". This CD is much more Berliner Schule/retro/sequencer based than Pro Sequentia and also contains the use of samples of "the EM-instrument", the Mellotron. The overall style of the music can be referred to what is called the "Golden Era" of electronic music. The theme of the CD is "Alchemy". For years René has been interested in this kind of philosophy in experiencing the world around us.

On October 28, 2006 there was a special concert given by EL-KA, René van der Wouden & Syngate artists at the GASOMETER, Oberhausen in the afternoon from 1:00 pm to 5:00 pm.

In January 2007 René released an old work from 2004 called "Recreation". This CD is the first of four re-releases.

Since April 2007 René has been working together with the British em-label: "Ambientlive Records" of the "Awakenings Ambient" music CD-series for the second re-release. This CD is released as ALR3017 and called "Kaleidoscopic Surrealism". The album contains previously unreleased music from the year 2000 and 2003. The content of the album has similarities with Pro Sequentia and Recreation, but there's also more ambient and space music on it. Most of the instruments of this album were of analogue character.

For the fall two more albums are planned to be released at Ambientlive Records with previously unreleased electronic music. These albums are compilations of tracks recorded from 1999 to 2002 and will be the last of the previous release period. All music has been remastered and prepared for CD. CD1 = called "Altostratus" (which means: low altitude clouds) and CD2 = called "Cirrustratus" (which means: high altitude clouds).

External links

* [http://www.renevanderwouden.net René van der Wouden]