Claudia & The Things (2007-now)

EERIE DAYS (2014-2016)

'Eerie Days' is Claudia's full-length solo Music Theater work where silence, sound, light, motion photography, darkness, video animations, overwhelmingness, and emptiness reconstruct the state of medically induced coma – the dreams and feelings.

'Eerie Days' is a metaphorical performance that does not aim at depicting one particular person’s coma dreams but rather giving an impression of how medically induced coma is experienced – a state of mind. It gives an idea how a person’s perception is altered through strong drugs, and how different and difficult the perception of a daily situation can become for someone who is imprisoned in a body that cannot move or communicate but whose brain nevertheless keeps perceiving the outside world.

The audience’s experience of this performance hopefully sheds some light on the mysteries of coma – a state where any human communication becomes impossible. Because it can happen at any time.

CE QU'ON VEND DANS LES MAGASINS (2012)

'Ce qu'on vend dans les magasins' is an absurdist a-cappella song for one performer and loop station based on a short story by the Russian writer Daniil Charms, written and performed by Claudia.

VINDEN BELEGGERS LEUK (2012)

'Vinden Beleggers Leuk' was a short Music Theater performance based on Facebook’s upcoming debut on the stock market that was written, designed, and performed by Claudia.

JOHN CAGE - SOLO NO. 87 (2012)

A solo from John Cage's Song Books.

T.I.M.E. (2012-2014)

T.I.M.E. was the ensemble of the Music Theater department of the Royal Conservatory of The Hague. A group of young performers from various art backgrounds who worked together for two years and created several Music Theater performances.

SHAWN AND THE ZEBRA (2009-2012)

A story written by daily life, co-authored by the human mind. Directed by imagination twists. Starring illusions. Or facts? Where is the truth? Does it matter? Will we ever know? Do we want to know? Did you hear what I heard? Did you see what I saw? A soudtrack to your own consciousness.

Shawn and the Zebra, the brainchild of Claudia Hansen and Julia Oschewsky, was an experimental voice/percussion duo, which encompassed the common ground of music and movement theater. In combining these disciplines, they went on a continuous quest to explore the movement in the music and the music in the movement. The incorporation of the visual and physical aspects associated with their music has been the core motivation for this ensemble. Both musicians composed the original music and the socially critical storyboard. Also, the stage and light design were created by the ensemble itself. The music was a combination of the human voice and percussion instruments such as marimba and kalimba, which were enhanced by effects and loop stations. Shawn and the Zebra was Music Theater which made the music - the main storytelling device - move around the theater's stage.

Their full-length show 'De</pending>' was starring a person searching for inner peace and happiness, having an odd relationship with its inner voice. It was about a person going through an important personal development in today's fast-beating and success-hunting society. It was about finding the balance between your inner self and your outer self. About being controlled by your inner world. About releasing yourself from yourself, about being controlled by the outer world. About depending, pending, depending, pending, and the urge to find your own balance.

ESPRIT DE CURIOSITÉS (2011)

Esprit de Curiosités was a performance collaboration with Sarah Jeffery and Anthony Leigh Dunstan at the ‘Colour Blind’ exhibition by the visual designers Andreas Gerolemou and Putri Sadiqah at Rhizomatic gallery in Amsterdam-Noord.

As Sarah said: 'It was a quasi-improvised Music Theater performance and an audience- and wall-inspired collaboration of expressive disciplines and conceptual aesthetics that pursued the fading art of dubiety.'

STUART SAUNDERS SMITH – SONGS I-IX (2011)

An iconic percussion repertoire piece.

FLEURVILLE (2011)

Two sopranos. A pianist. Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy and Johannes Brahms. An electric guitarist and a percussionist. A stage that begs for motion. A space that asks for color.

'Distillation' was a three-dimensional visualization of soprano repertoire, a sonic progression, a permission to let your musical imagination roam freely. A one-hour musical journey based on a few seconds of a train of thought. It zoomed in on emotions evoked by romantic vocal music. An unusual look at soprano repertoire.

Fleurville was a collective that, while never losing the focus on the beauty of old vocal repertoire, allowed musical influences of modern days rearrange the music and that brought those harmonies and melodies to a new age through physically performing and visually staging the music.

The collective consisted of Duri Collenberg, Claudia Hansen, Anja Loosli, Rasmus Nissen and Lydia Opilik.

BRAM STADHOUDERS KORPS (2008-2010)

Bram Stadhouders Korps was a free improv band founded by Bram Stadhouders. As someone described the band: 'This is technicolor cinema for the ears: sometimes the desert sand blows in your eyes, sometimes you get lost in an empty ghost town. Let the Bram Stadhouders Korps drag you into their private world. The young guitarist and composer Bram Stadhouders is not afraid of adventure. Completely unconcerned with stylistic borders, he moves freely between jazz, pop, and ambient. For this new large band, Stadhouders has drawn a musical treasure map on which his five-piece Korps chooses a different path every time, without losing sight of the end goal. These sonic tableaus create a cinematic panorama, full of exciting cliffhangers and changes of atmosphere both subtle and violent.'

At the festival Utrecht BOFT!, 3voor12 wrote: 'The Bram Stadhouders Korps breaks with the established tone of the evening. Monotony is the last thing that comes to mind in the ecstatic performance of these young dogs from Tilburg. Bram Stadhouders has been known as an upcoming jazz talent for many years. Tonight, with the help of laptops, synths, saxophone, delirious drums and percussion, he takes his guitar playing to the next level. Boldly and convincingly, the group drags you from one extreme to the other without ever getting lost in an overwhelming mash of sound. Think about Pat Metheny leading a jam session with Jagga Jazzist and Squarepusher. A welcome change on this melancholic evening.'

During November Music in Den Bosch, Gonzo Circus wrote: 'With the Bram Stadhouders Korps a whole regiment of talent is on stage. And does it need to be guided? I don’t think so. Let it go wild. However, what is happening on stage has been well thought out and the ideas are clear. The corps may have been named after Bram Stadhouders, but he is in principle just a pawn of the ensemble. Everyone has a prominent place in the sound spectrum. The Bram Stadhouders Korps is characterized by a cinematic sound. During certain passages, I was reminded of Tuxedomoon, without vocals but in a contemporary jacket. Most songs are subtly built with tickling string and/or electronic sounds. Quickly changing into massaging mood switches. The richly filled sound, with all kinds of wind, percussion, and synth additions, swells further and further. Especially the well-timed percussion accents of Onno Govaert give the music a threatening power. Yet it rarely gets explosive except for halfway through the concert in the noise track Future Vision. Adventurous highlights include Gravity Streams and Hello Sleeper. A nice introduction to a corps with potential." And avontuurlijkemuziek.nl wrote: "I was very impressed by the Bram Stadhouders Korps. As a duo with Onno Govaert, Bram is already great, but with this entire band behind him his music takes off!'

Bram Stadhouders Korps consisted of Santiago Botero, Harry Cherrin, Onno Govaert, Claudia Hansen, David Hoogerheide and Bram Stadhouders.

EEN KONIJN VAN PORSELEIN (2010)

'Een Konijn van Porselein' was a mime music theater performance for children written by Ad de Bont and Evrim Demirel for De Toneelmakerij in Amsterdam.

Toneelmakerij: 'Once upon a time, there was a spoiled and vain rabbit. He lived with two old people and didn't realize how kind they were to him. But the old people passed away, leaving the rabbit all alone. It marked the beginning of a long journey through strange places and meeting even stranger people. The rabbit received a winter carrot from a happy, dancing market vendor and froliced with a woodsman in search of companionship. He longed for the past. Spoiled he was no more; he wished he could love someone. But every time things started to feel good, the man with the hammer or the big bear appeared. The rabbit had to move on again, through wind and rain, autumn and winter. Until in the distance, a brave princess appeared. His feet and heart started dancing spontaneously. Was she in time to save him?'

The piece for three actors and three musicians toured around the Netherlands with Claudia Hansen, Peter van Heeringen, Hilde Kaizer, Bart de Kater, Daniël van Klaveren, Bart de Vrees, Jellantsje de Vries, Marike van Weelden and Marleen Wester.

AGAYA-SHI (2007)

'Agaya-Shi - The Third Half of the Last - Part I' was a non-stop performance that kept the listener from the beginning until the end in a sphere of sound and vision. The multimedia project was a fusion of acoustic instruments, electronic music, and visual art.

Modern classical viola and percussion, existing and own works, acoustic music, and live electronics, were combined with tapes and modern poetry, specially written for this project. The poems were recorded by the poet herself. The electronically modified voice formed a second layer to the music. In addition, there were projections on a big wall screen. A special computer program merged the projections, consisting of photographs, movies, and paintings, with the recorded poems. The same program transformed the live music from the viola and percussions into an electronic entity.

Agaya-Shi sounded like a story told to a listener but in a very unreal manner because the voice was modified and the sound of the music was vast. Sometimes floating and melodic, sometimes massive and insistent. Because of light effects and the moving pictures, Agaya-Shi became a vivid, lively, and stirring experience, wrapping the audience in a unique cocoon.

Agaya-Shi consisted of David Benqué, Alexandros Drymonitis, Claudia Hansen, Ernesto Illescas Peláez, Maria Moros Ballesteros, Thomas Myrmel, Françoise Schroeder and Rodrigo Tascon.