Biography

download an extended BIO & PRESS in Dutch here

The Rood Adeo official website keeps and manages the public calendar of songwriter-performer Rood Adeo and focuses primarely on the promotion of his music, lyrics and concerts. Secondly, this website preserves parts of the Rood Adeo (& NATD) archive from 1994 to present day, thus providing an insight into his peripheral activities. It is the intention of this website to gradually make Adeo’s work accessible to the public through exposion and publications in the hopes of preserving his aesthetic vision and hopefully to inspire many. Finally, this website provides access to Makershuis Silly Sound on the contact page.

Adeo has a gift for finding inspiration in unlikely places. To understand how he shapes and implements this in his work as a versatile and independant songwriter, it is worth also examining his work outside the parameters of the recordings and concerts. Because Adeo is always investigating, writing and playing in his spare time, his work and life are inextricably linked. In addition to info about albums, lyrics and concerts, this website's news page contains information about a number of art related projects and collaborations, whereas the press page offers many extended insight interviews. 

Writer Thomas Verbogt described Rood Adeo's songs as 'jazz in a tango-vehicle, trashcan blues, harrowing ballads and grubby visionairy suites, melancholic yet raucous. Personal lyrics, balanced arrangements and outstanding musicians provide the ingredients for the characteristic and touching sound of Adeo's songs. Never superficial, hence diverse and layered. Indeed, you could talk about the fascinating lyrics and the intriguing voice, or about the variety of instruments and the virtuosity they’re being played with. Yet maybe, it’s all about ambiance, telling different stories and bringing back memories in every song." [HP/DeTijd]

Although Adeo's work is inevitably influenced by his personal life, he is not a confessional lyricist. 'I tend to stay out of my personal life, keeping it observational and associative. Not too close and personal. That way I can stay sincere and save some for home.' 

One can detect in his work a constant force against counter-debilisation and human degradation, yet Adeo categorically refuses any attempt forcing him to take an outspoken stance on cultural issues. This, so as not to compromise to 'forces that should and only can dethrone themselves of power. All my songs can be qualified as protest songs because non of them support the status quo.’

A considered 'melodic songwriter, specialized in ballads', Rood is explicit about melody looked upon as 'not essential, no longer acceptable in music of the twenty-first century, because music needs to reflect the complexity and ugliness of the modern world.' Rood: 'I never felt that way, nor can i understand. If the world is so ugly, then what's the point of making it even uglier with ugly music? To me, rhythm is just our body, our boundaries, rhythm is like the light-speed barrier or Newton's limits that shape us and hold us in place. Rhythm is gravity, it's our vehicle, music wouldn"t get anywhere without it. But melody is the divine mystery, the creative force that lifts us up over the limits, giving us choice of direction. It is the free, massless, timeless, etherical spirit, the echo of the source, The human mind is the only medium that can bind the two and make sense of it. We can even use words to set them up.'

In 1995, Adeo's earliest songs 'You Invented Me', 'King In Yellow' and 'Sunday Afternoon' are recorded live at The Shuffle in 1995, with saxophonist Marieke van Zutphen and guitarists Frank de Kleer and Wout Pennings. In 1997, Adeo debuts with the NATD-album Fool's Tango, introducing co-composers Frank de Kleer and Bob Wisselink. Fool's Tango is rewarded ‘album of the month’ in Masic Maker, the foremost musicians’ magazine in The Netherlands. Surprisingly, Fay Lovsky appears on the duet 'You Invented Me'. This debut album eventually leads to invitations to popular national radio programs and paves the way to the release on the label Challenge Records. In 1998, Adeo and NATD are chosen by Sony/Philips to complete the first experimental recording sessions with the newly developed digital recording systemen SACD, previously initiated with Wynton Marsalis in New York. This project results in his second NATD-album, Walkin’ On Eggs, released on jazz label Challenge Records International, published by Polygram.

In August 1998, Rood Adeo and NATD wins the Public and Press Awards at the Sopot International Festival, Poland. In 1999, the single 'How About The Next Millennium' is being released and Walkin’ On Eggs SACD again presented at the Funkausstellung in Berlin. Adeo’s ballad 'To Be A Man' is released on the Polish Wroclaw Theatre Festival jubilee album Kronika XX by Luna Records with amongst others, Nick Cave and Cesaria Evora. Concerts at the Karlshamn Baltic Festival Sweden and the Wroclaw International Festival Poland follow shortly after.

In 2000, Adeo releases an extraordinary Portuguese peace of work, in collaboration with fado-singer Emanuel Pessanha: Rood & Emanuel, Retrato. An intriguing, nontraditional fado album. For the Wroclaw Theatre Festival 2000 Weill-edition, Rood Adeo & NATD arrange and perform Kurt Weill-songs, later released on the Luna Records album Weill 2000, with a.o. Cave, Anna Maria Jopek and Dee Dee Bridgewater.

Rood Adeo & NATD release their highly praised third album Transit Cellophane, comprising 17 tracks, on the label NWR, published by EMI. In 2005, Adeo As of now, he is letting go of his steadfast formation and starts working with varying band formations, instrument line-ups and many guest musicians. In August 2005, he performs in Denmark and records Jesse Mae Robinson’s 'The Other Woman' for the Nina Simone tribute album Greetings From Nijmegen. On the same album, Adeo accompanies Dutch Idols-finalist Maud Mulder on 'Everything Must Change'.

In March 2006, Rood Adeo & NATD close down the Night of Poetry Festival at Vredenburg Concert Hall Utrecht. Adeo's song ‘Observant Spectator’ is being released on the DVD Dichters in Woord en Beeld (Poets in Word and Frame). In May 2006, Adeo composes the music for Frank Boeijen’s song ‘Verloren Stad’ (Lost City), which is being released in November 2006 on Boeijen's CD/DVD As.

In 2009, Adeo releases his album Perfect Life in collaboration with producer Loek Schrievers, again with outstanding band members: Toon Meijer (saxes, clarinets) Pieter Klaassen and Loek Schrievers (guitars), Jan Flubacher (double bass) and Thijs Verwer (drums, percussion).

In 2010 the compilation album The Beatuy Of It All is being released in limited edition for KWF.

In 2012, Mindful Indifference is being released on the label Supertracks/Challenge Records International. On this album, Adeo starts experimenting as sound-engineer, producing and recording his songs single-miced, playing most of the instruments by himself. On Mindful Indifference, Adeo's stories are being put out in the open field. They breathe air, some with life-affirming joy, some full of loneliness. Adeo’s timing and feel, his basic approach of bass and guitar in contrast with his lyrical touch on the piano and his gorgeous voice, all are being brought to daylight.

In October 2018, the album Voluntary Intakes is being released on the Kroese Records label. This extended hybrid of new and old songs is the first of a diptych concept album. The second one of this complementary pair will be released in Summer 2021

 

Guest appearances

ROOD ADEO has featured many guest performers, among whom vocalists DeeDee Bridgewater, Dutch Idols finalist Maud Mulder, Esther Croez and Micheline van Hautem, guitar players Loek Schrievers and Wout Pennings, saxophonists Chester Washington, Miguel Boelens and Rinus Groeneveld, trumpet players Eef van Breen and Jarmo Hoogendijk, trombonists Arjen Reeser and Bert Boeren, violinists Oene van Geel, Guido Jansen and Friedmar Hitzer, Zapp4 String Quartet and Jules Deelder on drums. Fay Lovsky appeared on the duet ‘You Invented me’. Bariton Ernst Daniël Smid appeared on the duet 'Baby Don't You Like My New Tattoo'.

 

(Inter)national concerts & RTV

Sopot International Song Festival Poland (Public and Press Award) • Karlshamn Baltic Festival Sweden • Wroclaw Theatre Festival Poland • MdM Warschau Poland • Wroclaw Theatre Festival Poland • Europa Festival Germany • TW Festival Denmark • NPO's Opera Special • KRO’s Leidsekade Live • Vara’s Spijkers Met Koppen • NCRV’s Volgspot • VPRO’s Club Lek Radio 3FM • VPRO’s De Plantage • National Film Festival Utrecht • Jazz in Duketown Den Bosch • Festival Boulevard de Parade Den Bosch • Zomerfeesten Nijmegen • Bluesnight Roermond • Uit Festival Utrecht • Nacht van de Poëzie Utrecht • Erneuerbare Energie Tagung Germany International Film Festval Rotterdam • Nationaal Film Festival Utrecht, a.m.m.

 

℗2016-2018 All Song Published by ROOD Productions/Silly Sound

©1997-2018 Challenge Records International/Polygram • A-Records/BMG • NWR/EMI • Supetracks • Kroese Records