{"id":9,"date":"2024-06-13T14:37:40","date_gmt":"2024-06-13T12:37:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nieuw.lowelldykstra.com\/?page_id=9"},"modified":"2026-02-13T09:29:19","modified_gmt":"2026-02-13T08:29:19","slug":"about","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/lowelldykstra.com\/","title":{"rendered":"About"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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About<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t
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Lowell Dykstra<\/strong> was born in Exeter, Ontario Canada. In 1959 the family moved from Hamilton to the Netherlands.<\/p>

After Secondary School, he attended the Leeuwarden Music Academy where he studied the guitar with Guido Topper.
In 1979 he received his diploma and from that time on he had a job as a guitar teacher for almost 17 years. During this teaching carreer he started composing in the modern classical idiom. Until then, the only composing activity had been educational material and popsong writing. The Beatles, The Beach Boys, Paul Simon, Don Mclean, Crosby, Stills & Nash were never far away in his songs.<\/p>

He took up composition lessons with Willem Frederik Bon at the ‘Conservatorium van Groningen’. After Bon\u2019s untimely death, he pursued his composition training with Tristan Keuris at the ‘Conservatorium van Utrecht’ with whom he graduated in 1990 by receiving the Prize for Composition. Many commissions have followed since then.<\/p>

He has been selected twice (1988 and 1992) for the annual \u201cProject Young Composers\u201d organised by \u201cHet Nederlands Balletorkest\u201d for\u00a0\u2018Alternation\u2019<\/strong>\u00a0(orchestra) and\u00a0\u2018Fantasia\u2019<\/strong>\u00a0(24 wind instruments).<\/p>

He was also a guest lecturer in composition at the ‘Fontys Conservatorium in Tilburg’ for a year.<\/p>

His works have been performed by various ensembles and individual musicians. They are, among others:<\/p>

Het Nederlands Ballet Orkest \u2022 Het Noord Nederlands Orkest \u2022 Het Noord- Hollands Philharmonisch orkest \u2022 Het Nederlands Kamerkoor \u2022 Studium Chorale \u2022 Het Nederlands Studenten Kamerkoor \u2022 Jeugd Orkest Nederland \u2022 Het VU-Kamer Orkest \u2022 baritone Maarten Koningsberger \u2022 soprano Irene Maessen \u2022 violin\/piano duo Tjeerd Top & Mariken Zandvliet \u2022 Duo Bilitis (Ekaterina Levental and Eva Tebbe)\u2022 Soli Brass \u2022 Vocal Ensemble Cantatrix\u2022 Hollands Vocaal Ensemble \u2022 Ren\u00e9 Berman \u2022 Duo Beumer & van Ham\u00a0 \u2022 The Bron Saxophone Quartet \u2022 Izhar Elias & Channa Malkin \u2022 Prisma string trio \u2022 Saxophonist Wildy Zumwalt
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Most of his compositions are published by DONEMUS<\/strong> Amsterdam. For a complete list click here<\/a>.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t

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Sources of inspiration<\/h2>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t
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“My music, and certainly that of the last couple of years, focusses on melody and harmony, both instrumental and vocal. The element harmony serves me as a pivotal vehicle out of which I build my melodies. My song cycle \u201cLyrics of life\u201d for soprano and guitar and \u201cDe tuin van Epicurus\u201d for flute, oboe, violin, bassoon and harp are striking examples. Harmony, when accurately designed, with clear rhythm creates direction and therefore comprehensible to follow as a listener which I find most important. I also tend to write more polyfonically lately.<\/p>

My musical inspiration comes while walking through open fields, among woodlands and from all sorts of music, mainly from the classical composers Bach, Beethoven, Stravinsky, Sibelius and Honegger together with Frank Martin. And then of course, there is so much fine music and great masterpieces by other composers. By the way, I believe almost every music lover has a favourite piece or song in some genre or whatever kind. Other inspiration comes from (English) poetry and paintings.
From time to time I listen to Renaissance music, especially the vocal music. From the Romantic period it is Bruckner, Brahms and Elgar who I deeply admire. Music is all in the air, you just pick whatever suits you best for your needs. In this context, I mention \u201cEldorado\u201d from the song cycle “Lyrics of life\u201d which may very well have been sung in a saloon in mid-20th century America. With the exception of\u00a0 the short instrumental bridges, that is.<\/p>

For me, traditional folk music ( I am not a keen listener) is confined to Flamenco and music from South America but occasionally when I happen to hear it, music from Ireland can stir me as well. I don\u2019t favour folk music from the Balkan.
When I am out, walking over fields and heather and through woodlands in the area where I live (which I do every day) inspiration may come as well.”<\/p>

Sometimes, inspiration, as described above, plays no role. You start by writing down a few notes or a chord, even if they are bad. You try something, and then you interact with it.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

About Lowell Dykstra was born in Exeter, Ontario Canada. In 1959 the family moved from Hamilton to the Netherlands. After Secondary School, he attended the Leeuwarden Music Academy where he studied the guitar with Guido Topper. In 1979 he received his diploma and from that time on he had a job as a guitar teacher […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"elementor_header_footer","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-9","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"blocksy_meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lowelldykstra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/9","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lowelldykstra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lowelldykstra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lowelldykstra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lowelldykstra.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9"}],"version-history":[{"count":382,"href":"https:\/\/lowelldykstra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/9\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2966,"href":"https:\/\/lowelldykstra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/9\/revisions\/2966"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lowelldykstra.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}