One song is always mentioned when it comes to the music of Ruud Bos: the yearning melody of ‘Telkens Weer’, sung in 1975 by Willeke Alberti in the film Red See by Frans Weiss. Bos had already composed the melody before the words were there. Friso Wiegersma then wrote the lyrics – and together they created a song that has become one of the most moving classics in Dutch song history. And to an undisputed highlight in Ruud Bos’s repertoire. But there was much more.
Ruud Bos, who says he has put about 1,500 to 2,000 songs to music, died on Friday. He was 87 years old and still active.
His career began in 1959, when he joined the ensemble of the committed cabaret artist Jaap van de Merwe as a pianist.
He was immediately noticed by the flair with which he took on the accompaniment – much more energetic than the weekday music that usually set the tone in the cabaret of that time. In that group he also met the comedian Marjan Berk, with whom he was later married for a long time.
Mister Owl on the piano
Since then Ruud Bos has worked on a richly varied oeuvre that grew and flourished especially in the 1960s and 1970s. He composed dozens of signature melodies, including the swinging tune of the talk show presented by Willem Duys. Off the cuffthe enticing title song of the comedy series Say aaathe dynamic signature tune of the drama series The factory and all the spry sing-along tunes in the puppet series The Fabeltjeskrant – including the carnivalesque hit ‘Hup, there’s Willem with the pipe wrench’. At home, on his piano, there was a doll of Mister De Uil for a reason.
Vibrant swinging jazz
In the 1960s Ruud Bos also led a big band with the best Dutch jazz musicians of the time, commissioned by VPRO radio. Last year, the Dutch Jazz Archive produced a CD with recordings by this virtually unknown formation, which showed that Bos also had an unexpected side: that of the sharply swinging jazz musician with advanced arrangements at the top level.
Bos continued to work until old age. “I am busy with music day and night, so to speak,” he said in a TV interview. But where all that musicality came from, he said he did not know. “It’s a secret and I want to keep it that way. I don’t need to know where that source is.”