visiting the cittern builder

When Bert and I were in the UK last week, for appearances at the main stages of two beautiful festivals (Stainsby festival & Brampton Live), we also visited Roger Bucknall of Fylde guitars in his workshop in Penrith in the north of England. Roger has made the very fine cittern that we will bring along on our journey to Bhutan, the instrument that will be played upon in all the diverse countries we cross, finally to be donated to the Kilu Music School in Bhutan.

cittern builder Roger Bucknall and his wife

A road in England

Our concert at the Stainsby festival was our debut appearance at a UK festival and we felt immediately at home with the very attentive crowd. The good feeling continued the next day at Brampton. In a newspaper review of the Stainsby festival (Derbyshire Times) the reviewer wrote: “Linde’s hauntingly sweet voice sent chills down the spine in songs such as ‘Sail Away To The Sea’ and ‘Gone, Gonna Rise Again’, while she got the crowd dancing with the upbeat ‘This Train Is Bound For Glory’, with fine accompaniment from guitarist Bert Ridderbos”

the journey so far

This last winter, as I played in a small church in Groningen with my program of Winterliederen / winter songs, a man came up to us with a story that almost seemed too good to be true. He asked us if we wanted to come along on a collective journey of two months over land to Bhutan to visit the festivities there of the crowning of the King, making music as we travelled in Turkey, Iran, Pakistan and India, in a spirit of friendship. All would be filmed..

It took many months before all was confirmed, but it immediately felt good. Since then we’ve met the other group members and things are falling into place. Though we will leave end of September 2008, it seems like we’re already on our way. The project has brought us to surprising, new places  within our own country and we’ve met people that we wouldn’t have otherwise.

Last week we met a man, for instance, who will very kindly borrow his Landrover Discovery to us. This will become the ‘music car’ of the total of 8 cars that are going to undertake the journey. Rogier, as the man is called, lives in a beautiful house in the middle of The Netherlands. He’s a business man.  Sitting outside in his garden,  we were treated to colourful stories about his earlier travels with the car, as well as to bread, cheese and drinks.

Some sort of a symbol during the journey has become the cittern. This beautiful 10 stringed instrument that Bert often uses on our recordings and during concerts can also be found on Renaissance paintings. ‘Road to Bhutan’ will acquire a cittern especially for the journey that will be used by Bert in concerts while we’re travelling. Finally after all it’s adventures the instrument will be donated to the Kilu Music School in Bhutan. In a few weeks when Bert and I are in the UK for concerts at two festivals, we will bring a special cittern back to The Netherlands with us. There it will be painted by Henk Helmantel, the famous Dutch painter, who lives in a small village called Westeremden in Groningen not far from where we live.

So..the cittern, that will travel over land and sea via England to The Netherlands, to Bhutan, will be studied and painted by Henk. Then it will sound in all these other countries as all will be filmed. Finally it will get a new home in a Himalaya Kingdom. How beautiful!!

Linde (Groningen, The Netherlands)