Nynke Laverman - OAK

Her latest performance OAK is a magical journey through the realm of the soul, in which trees, animals and stones tell their stories. Through songs, spoken word and storytelling, together with sound artist Sytze Pruiksma she weaves an ingenious musical landscape, sometimes edgy and of today, sometimes with the conjuring cadence of an ancient ritual.

With OAK she builds on what she sowed with her previous performance Plant. In an atmospheric setting of analog video, Nynke examines and mirrors our Western worldview in a tender, humorous way while bringing to life a different view of reality. The image of humans as destroyers of the earth cannot be the whole story. We are so much more.

Together with composer/musician Sytze Pruiksma, Nynke Laverman has been making adventurous, atmospheric music with strongly substantive, poetic lyrics for over 20 years. In it she combines her mother tongue, Frisian, with English. After her debut with Frisian fado, national and international recognition followed for her idiosyncratic work and her spirited voice: 'a leaf-blown shimmer of a voice' according to The Independent.

In 2021, she released Plant, a penetrating album that the press called hypnotic, like a musical movie in which you get lost. The spoken word piece Your Ancestor finds its way around the world, opening many hearts, festivals and conferences as a moving wake-up call.

Nynke finds her inspiration in cultures that live in harmony with their surroundings, such as the Kazakh nomads in Mongolia with whom she spends time. Their view of the world, in which everything is connected to everything, ensures that questioning her own Western worldview becomes the common thread in her work.

Nynke: "Through my music, I hope to evoke a world in which people are better able to listen to themselves.