Jozef van Wissem announces brand new album, ‘Nosferatu. The Call Of The Deathbird’, out October 31st via Incunabulum Records (LP, CD, Digital).

“La Cinémathèque Française in Paris commissioned me to write and perform the score at the presentation of the restored version of Nosferatu. I was a bit overwhelmed by its success. It was sold out! I wasn’t going to repeat it. But people kept asking…” – explains Jozef van Wissem, speaking about the series of events that lead to the recording of his newest LP – ‘Nosferatu. The Call Of A Deathbird’.

Jozef van Wissem | Photo by Michal Sobocinsky

Jozef comments: “In the beginning the soundtrack was more improvised and reactive to the images but after a few times the audience kind of showed me the way”. Van Wissem speaks about this particular experience as probably one of the most unusual ones in the discography of composers. Preferring to score the music before seeing the film, Jozef is attracted by the way his creation integrates in the structure of a movie. In a minimalistic way. Using only particular sounds and textural elements, that speaks to you like a good prose: “I have the same with literary work” – agrees Jozef: “For example the writing of Bukowski. Very to the point, short sentences, but a lot of information in a few words”.

While the specifics of working on a horror-film had given the whole different feel to van Wissem: “I think that music in horror films gives the composer more freedom to experiment than in any other genre. It seems more open. Experimental sound in film nowadays is something producers are afraid of. Experiment is the life blood of music”.

“I found an old 7-inch single with recordings of extinct birds on a market in Rotterdam”, explained the composer, speaking about the connection with ‘The Call of The Deathbird’. Enhancing the sounds of birds singing, van Wissem combined them with the Baroque lute play and suspense-type-of-bass pattern. Manipulating the sounds of electric guitar in alternate tuning, Jozef van Wissem manages to create the feeling of fear, something equal to what the victims of Count Orlok have experienced.

Drawing the parallels between the age-old classics and the recent pandemic composer says: “To me Nosferatu personifies this Death Bird of the Plague. The Black Death depicted in the film offers a timeless parallel with contemporary society. The vampire Count Orlok infests the city with rats and people are infected with the plague. They must quarantaine. This provokes hysteria. Much like nowadays”.

Starting rather quietly, Jozef van Wissem gradually adds more and more instruments and textural elements to the buildup, coming from total silence to noise in 90. “A dense, slow death-metal!” – sums up Jozef in the recent interview for New York Times.

Jozef van Wissem | Photo by LCDO Visions

Jozef van Wissem is an avant-garde composer and lutenist playing his all black, one-of- a-kind custom-made baroque lute all around the world. The titles and the nature of his works often have a Christian-mystical appeal and the music he creates is simply timeless. In 2013 van Wissem won the Cannes Soundtrack Award at the Cannes Film Festival for Jim Jarmusch’s ‘Only Lovers Left Alive’. Van Wissem has earned much critical acclaim for his work, “the liberation of the lute” – as the composer calls it.

Over the years, Jozef van Wissem has collaborated with Zola Jesus, Tilda Swinton as well as with his long-time collaborative partner and friend, Jim Jarmusch, with whom Jozef recorded four albums together. In December 2017, van Wissem was invited to perform the madrigal depicted in Caravaggio’s painting The Lute Player (1596) at the Hermitage Museum in Saint-Petersburg. In February 2021 Jozef van Wissem premiered a new black Baroque lute on Dutch National TV. The instrument had the Latin words “Ex Mortis” inscribed in the neck.