The Haarlem Eva Scheltema goes through life as a musician and singer Veya. As a young girl she threw herself into the violin and classical music. Today, Veya uses the violin to create catchy pop songs. Her first album will be released this weekend. In Culture Club a portrait of this passionate pop lady.
Veya loves her violin – NH Nieuws
Carefully, Veya takes her violin out of her suitcase and begins to play. Her stylish home in an old school in Haarlem Noord is ideal for a living room concert. It looks like an existing piece, but Veya improvises.
“I love playing whatever comes to mind in the morning. It’s quite easy for me to come up with melodies,” she laughs. You can also hear these melodies in the pop songs she writes and which will soon appear on her first album Escape the world.
As a six-year-old girl, little Eva was eager to play the violin. Her mother allowed her to go to school when she turned seven. “I practiced very hard then and learned quickly,” says Eva. “I started playing classical music in orchestras from the age of eight and I really liked that.” Yet as a child, Eva dropped out at some point. “I didn’t feel the same passion for classical music as my friends who went to the conservatory. That was also very sad because I wanted to continue in music,” says Eva.
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She rediscovered the love for her violin through jazz and pop music. In her twenties she can now make a living from making music. As a session musician she was a.o. active with the popular DJ Armin van Buuren and Friends of Amstel Live. And as a pop musician Veya, she has recently made great strides. “Now I find it a challenge to use the violin, which is so attached to classical music, in my songs,” says Veya. “I love that I can do whatever I want with the violin.”
Veya knows how to seduce young and old with her poppy songs. “I was recently at a festival in Hungary. There was a girl of six and her name was Lea,” says Veya. “And Lea was dancing and going all out on my music, that was heartwarming. And then she made a doll for me. Very sweet.”
In the corona time, Veya played for demented elderly in Haarlem. “I also played my own music there and it was fantastic,” says Veya. “I played Escape the world and then they took each other’s hands and started dancing. That was touchingly beautiful.”
Friday September 16, Veya presents her first album Escape the world in Cinetol in Amsterdam.
Culture Club at NH Nieuws
In the new Culture Club programme, NH Nieuws visits culture makers from our province to ask them about their motivations. All episodes of Culture Club can be viewed on this one special page.