Sneha Girap (Editor)

Alex van Heerden

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Role
  
Musical Artist

Also known as
  
Dandyesque

Died
  
January 7, 2009

Occupation(s)
  
Musician

Albums
  
In the Name of Bushtech

Name
  
Alex Heerden


Alex van Heerden Alex van Heerden Discography at Discogs

Born
  
c. 23 November 1974 (
1974-11-23
)

Genres
  
Jazz, ghoema, vastrap, boeremusiek, the riel, electronic music

Instruments
  
Accordion, trumpet, voice

Labels
  
smallfunk, New Cape Records

Similar People
  
Robbie Jansen, Derek Gripper, Hotep Idris Galeta, Basil Coetzee, Winston Mankunku Ngozi

Birth name
  
Alex Scott Van Heerden

Alex van heerden tongue of the hunter cubenx remix


Alex van Heerden (23 November 1974 – 7 January 2009) was a jazz musician from Cape Town, South Africa.

Contents

Alex van Heerden Cameos of a Frontier Rogue Alex van Heerden

Career

He was a self-taught musician who started to play trumpet at age 17, to avoid compulsory military training, during the apartheid era of South Africa. Later, on he began exploring music throughout various ways; jazz, the Karoo desert, vastrap, ghoema and electronic music played important roles.

He worked with Robbie Jansen in Jansen's jazz group Sons of Table Mountain. Van Heerden also worked together with Swedish musician and producer Håkan Lidbo, creating electronic music on the side of the jazz and the vastrap he's been making. In a whole, he was a truly creative musician, always finding his own interpretations of both old and new music genres, developing music in a true way.

He worked, together with his brother-in-law, composer and guitarist Derek Gripper, to recreate the rural music of the Western Cape within an acoustic setting. Together they created a style of music dubbed avant-goema, using string quartet, guitar, trumpet, vocals and accordion to open up new musical spaces within the musical landscapes of vastrap, langarm, boeremusiek, goema, and contemporary minimalism, jazz and improvisation. Their two CD releases, Sagtevlei and Ale!x document this unique musical journey, as well as the score for the work for string quartet, guitar, accordion and trumpet Spore by die Bek van 'n Ystervarkgat.

Van Heerden died, age 34, in a car accident in Cape Town.

Discography

  • Cape Jazz Classics (Gallo, 1996)
  • Gramadoelas, Gramadoelas (Afrimusik, 1999)
  • Cape Doctor, Robbie Jansen (Mountain, 2000)
  • Sagtevlei, with Derek Gripper (Open, 2003)
  • Future Cape, with Hilton Schilder) (Dala Flat, 2006)
  • Simple, with Håkan Lidbo (Container, 2006)
  • Bushtech, (Smallfunk, 2007)
  • Tales of Droëland, with Paul Miller (Smallfunk, 2008)
  • In the Name of Bushtech (SinergyNetworks, 2008)
  • Nefertiti, with Magnus Johansson (Mavo, 2008)
  • Ale!x, with Derek Gripper and Brydon Bolton
  • References

    Alex van Heerden Wikipedia