FEAN started as a musical artist-in-residence project in a little church in the Frisian village Katlyk. The group consists of Piiptsjilling (Jan Kleefstra, Romke Kleefstra, Mariska Baars and Rutger Zuydervelt). For FEAN they are accompanied by Belgian guests Annelies Monseré, Sylvain Chauveau and Joachim Badenhorst.
The Piiptsjilling members are used to perform and record together, and adding the three Belgian guests (who didn’t play together before) added an extra dimension to the group’s dynamics, resulting in a concentrated yet playful series of improvisations, that were later mixed and edited to two FEAN albums.
The FEAN project gets its inspiration from the ecological decay of peatland in the Dutch province Friesland and in other parts of Europe. Agriculture and peat extraction are threatening the landscape severely and with long term consequences. This forms the underlying thought for the improvised performances.
On September 6 2019, the group (minus Sylvain Chauveau) played at the big Lebuinus Church in the city of Deventer (the Netherlands), organized by De Perifeer and Vondst. With its reverberant acoustics, this was a perfect space for a FEAN concert. The concert was recorded, slightly edited and published on the site of Alienocene. And although this 20+ minute recording doesn’t come close to the live experience, it might convey at least some of its magic… Check the live recording here .