"Oh, Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth!"

Thus begins Canticum Canticorum, or Song of Songs, one of the most beautiful love poems in world literature.
It describes the love story of a young woman and a young man, with moments of happiness and satisfaction, and moments of fear and doubt. Passages with reflections and drama. Exalted passion, night scenes, hymns. What is striking is the ubiquitous eroticism; inseparably connected with love. And literally shameless by the purity of that love. And what also stands out is the beautiful balance between the girl and the boy; both in action and in expression. In fact: she takes the initiative to visit him when they are just getting to know each other. No docility from one person, but two independent people who find each other in love.

The composition was written for mixed choir, solo soprano, bandoneón, strings and piano and consists of eight parts. The text, a selection from the original, is sung in Latin; this one of the oldest translations of the original Hebrew text. Total length 40 minutes. Four of the eight parts are already performed by the Groot Concertkoor Amsterdam in Novemver 2022.
The entire piece is expected to be premiered on October 19th 2024.



for an impression of part 1: go to the AUDIO tab.



available: MINOTAUROTANGO the CD!

music by Martin de Ruiter, poetry by Juan Carlos Tajes, performed by Quinteto Capital Tango. CD can be ordered via the 'contact' page on this site, and is also available as download via: www.cdbaby.com and on Spotify: www.spotify.com



photo: Quinteto Capital Tango, with Juan Tajes and Bennie Bartels performing MinoTauroTango in concert

biography

Martin de Ruiter
Composer and bandoneon player Martin de Ruiter studied at the Amsterdam School of the Arts (acccordion) and at the Rotterdam Conservatory (chamber music).
Initially, he focused mainly on contemporary music and played with ensembles like the Netherlands Wind Ensemble, Slagwerk Den Haag, the Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra, Scapino Ballet and the Metropole Orchestra. He participated in theater productions by Toneelgroep Amsterdam, Nationale Toneel and Huis aan de Amstel, both as player and composer. As a soloist and conductor he worked at festivals in the Netherlands (e.g. Musica Sacra), in Germany, Austria, Belgium and France (e.g. Octobre en Normandie in Rouen).

In 1992 he began playing the bandoneon in the ensemble Che Tango and in 1995 he founded the quartet El Conjunto, a company he later expanded to the quintet Conjunto Nuevo. These groups did concerts in the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, France, Uruguay and Argentina, and appeared in several TV programs and at various festivals (including Poetry International , Dunya Festival and Joventango Festival Internacional Tango in Uruguay)
With guitar player Kay Sleking he played the opening concert of the International Bandoneon Festival in Krefeld (Germany) tin 2012. And in 2014 he founded Capital Tango, a trio with Andreas Suntrop (electric guitar) and Annie Tångberg (cello), later extended to Quinteto Capital Tango, with Sebastiaan van Delft (piano) and Erik Winkelmann (contrabass).
In 2015 he wrote music for the theatrical dance performance MinoTauroTango on texts by the Uruguayan poet/singer Juan Tajes. This music was performed by Quinteto Capital Tango and Juan Tajes and released on CD.
Since 2018 The Martin de Ruiter trio has been playing music on the cutting edge of tango and jazz, with Elliot Muusses on electric guitar and Erik Winkelman on contrabass. He played the solo bandoneon in the tango opera Maria de Buenos Aires by Astor Piazzolla in several performances in the Netherlands and Japan.
He has written several scores for silent films including un Chien Andalou (1929), Submarine (1928) and Der Mandarin (1918): the latter was performed live at the Konzerthaus in Vienna.
His composition Canticum Canticorum for mixed choir, soprano, bandoneon and string orchestra will be premiered on October 19th 2024.
Martin de Ruiter is programmer of Eye on Sound in EYE Film Museum Netherlands. In this position he initiated the Filmmuseum Biennale in 2003 and started the successful series Cinema Concerten. He invited composers like: Louis Andriessen, Florian Magnus Mayer, Henny Vrienten to write new music for film, and musicians like Asko|Schönberg, Corrie van Binsbergen Ensemble, Spinvis and Tomoko Mukaiyama to perform.





performing with: Toneelgroep Amsterdam, Naska, Barbara Duijfjes, Het Nationale Toneel, conducting the Newt Hinton Ensemble