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“Influenced by the great tradition of the European art film,
a love of books and music and the look and sound of the ECM and
Windham Hill
record labels I believe that
the natural beauty of our planet, its conservation and its art can be celebrated with
commercial viability to benefit all.”
“My liefde vir die natuur,
musiek, beeld- en woord kuns word uitstekend verteenwoordig deur
internasionale opname etikette soos ECM en
Windam Hill. Ek glo dat daar ook ‘n bestaansreg in Suid Afrika en in
Afrikaans is vir ‘n etiket met ‘n kultuur van skoonheid en 'n omgewings bewussyn.”
One can travel with only the destination in mind, or one can travel with the journey itself
as the purpose.
Trying to get ‘there’ in a hurry often leaves the journey stripped of life
itself, void of the importance of light and darkness that fills ones passage.
A winding road leads one to many places, many of these places unimagined and unexpected. The road may be treacherous and difficult, yet there always is support along the way, real or veiled. Nothing can be achieved without help by others. And nothing can be done without inspiration. I feel driven by the music that I hear, songs on the radio, records, the music I hear in my head, or in the sounds of the wind and the sea, this is what makes me do what I do.
We stand on this earth under a most amazing expanse of ever changing light. Whenever I look to the sky I feel touched by something profound and mysterious. There is magic in the slanting morning sun, in the haze in the blue sky of a summer’s afternoon, in the shafts of silver sun pouring through the winter clouds over the mountains. The light from the skies reflects on the earthy plains below, illuminating our existence with the gift of life, and giving life to all forms – all objects are visually present by the degree of light present or absent.It is the challenge of the painter to capture this light on canvas, of the poet to fill his verse with its lucidity, of the sage to live by its inspiration, and of music to radiate this magic.
I quote Marc Chagall:
I am your son/ On earth who walks with difficulty/ You have filled my hands/
With colours, brushes/ I do not know how to paint you./ Must I paint the sky, the earth, my heart,
/Towns on fire, people fleeing/ My eyes in tears/ Or must I flee, escape to whom?/ He who gives
life down below/ He who sends death/ Perhaps he will bring it about/ That my
picture fills with light. Poéms, 1940.
When I first heard the sounds of the blues guitar, it was the cry of Peter Green’s electric guitar on an Otis Spann record. I was only about 15 at that time, it was then that I heard Lightning Hopkins too. I was taken by something I heard expressed in the sound of their bending of the strings, their blues brimming with raw life. Later the Kölhn concert by Keith Jarrett sounded like a spiritual brother to the rich texture of Dollar Brand/Abdullah Ibrahim’s masterwork “Echoes from Africa”. The incredible work of Arvo Part filled me with the wonder of the possibilities of sound composition. The words read & sung by Gert Vlok Nel contains the same qualities, his inflection and meter, speaking of things as primal as earth and sky, and as modern as e.e. cummings. And without the rock of Pink Floyd and folk-rock of Neil Young, and of course, Bob Dylan, the kaleidoscope would be incomplete, specially considering that Dylan copied his folk hero Woody Guthrie who is like a Steinbeck in song. Think of the king of the beat writers, Jack Kerouack, and all the old English ballads, brought to America by immigrants, that influenced the folk music movement of the sixties so profoundly and you can start tracing circles within circles.
Record labels with a specific vision like Windham Hill (American) and ECM (European) gave me an idea of what I wanted to do when I started thinking about establishing a recording label towards 1998. Of course I had to accomplish this in a South African context, and often within a predominantly Afrikaans context. I founded Afrimusik.com in 1999, and started to bring some aspects of my vision into reality.
Now the focus has shifted for me to create another production label that can allow me more freedom to bring my personal creativity to the fore. Towerlig will act as a production house for my Yoga tutor, for specialist Spoken Word productions and music productions. It will also serve as a personal a personal information brochure.
Writing from home just outside of Stellenbosch town I can marvel at the light that streams in through the window through the forest of trees. Here I can take in the sun that rise from behind the mountains towards the east. The scenic drive to the Hydro is as great, trips in all directions takes in the wonderful country that the Boland is famous for. Going in to town for work is often more inspiring rather than a drag.
To share of my love of nature and all the heaps of counterculture that I have consumed over the years to a fresh audience is as important to me. By exposing different groups to other influences more people can broaden their horizons. The connection with the young crowd at the University gymnasium where I teach and the poetry readings we organize with the literary set somehow has something in common. Life should be about about everything, not just one thing.
I would like Towerlig to contain bits of everything that I cherish and chase after. It’s about capturing
some of what I experience paddling out into the sea, floating between sky and sea.
Riding the surf. It is about the stuff of poems and magic rhythms,
of the ancient threads that
weaves the fabric of our consciousness.
Johann, Stellenbosch, 1/06/2002
The morning sunlight from my desk, picture taken outside by Naomi.
She also took the Home Page picture at Betty's Bay (Boegoe, and me in the other corner), summer 2002
and the protrait above, Stellenbosch 2003.