The Alkmaar city carillonneur Christiaan Winter has composed a brand new piece of music. Especially for the celebration of 450 years of Alkmaar Relief this year, there is now also a ‘Relief Suite’. Yesterday he first heard it on the carillon of the Waagtoren.
Alkmaar celebrates that 450 years ago it was the first city in the Netherlands to resist the Spanish army during the Eighty Years’ War. To also reflect on this musically, carillonneur Christiaan Winter composed an ‘Ontsuite’.
Three carillons
The piece of music can be heard on three carillons in the municipality: the Grote Kerk, Waagtoren and the Grote Kerk in De Rijp. To media partner Alkmaar Central Winter says that the composition incorporates the encirclement of Alkmaar, the storming, the flooding of the surrounding meadows and the victory.
It is true that the ‘Ontzetsuite’ was made for all Alkmaarders, but mayor Anja Schouten is one of the few with a paper version of the piece of music. “It said: ‘for Anja Schouten, our mayor mother, from your carillonneur’, I think that is very beautiful and special.”