'I’m really proud of myself and everyone involved to see it coming together into a completely unique experience of Shakespeare...'
Wike Schippers, who is involved in the Cork School of Music production of The Tempest this week.
My name is Wike Schippers. You pronounce my first name “Veekuh”. I’m not going to bother explaining the pronunciation of my last name. Just call me Skippers, I’ve made my peace.
I’m Dutch, as you might have guessed. I moved to Cork to do a master’s composition at Cork School of Music having previously done a bachelor’s in songwriting at Codarts University of the Arts in Rotterdam.
I’m not sure what to call my job, honestly. I’m used to calling myself a singer-songwriter, but now that composer is on the list it’s becoming quite a mouthful. Let’s just say I write and play music. Music of different kinds and for different purposes. I’m currently working on developing the more orchestral and the more instrumental side. I’m also working on writing music to accompany stories, theatre specifically.
I’m currently doing some composing and musical directing for “The Tempest”, the play that is being put on at CSM, which I will tell you about in a bit. I also sing, which is something I love deeply.
In 2020 I released my first album called “Spring”, which is full of songs about loneliness and the desire to connect and belong. I’m currently working on an EP the title of which is going to be *drum roll*….“Control”. You can keep a secret, right?
In Wageningen, a small town in the Netherlands.
In Ballyphehane, Cork.
I’m an only child. I’ve got two fantastic a-little-too-proud and a-little-too-worried parents and a gaggle of kind, creative, intelligent, hilarious friends some of which I’ve known since I was very young. I’ve also got aunts and uncles and cousins and grandparents I love to be around. So, contrary to popular belief, being an only child didn’t make me very lonely. I did have a couple of imaginary brothers and sisters at one point, so make of that what you will.
I know it’s classic to have that one friend who’s always there for you, but I got incredibly lucky and I have multiple. With most of my best friends so far away, though, my housemate has become someone I really rely on and who’s always around for a hug or a laugh or a good conversation or dragging me outside to exercise. She’s the kind of person you’d want to meet after moving to a strange country all alone and I’m so happy to have met her.
I remember holding three fingers up to tell someone my age and thinking that meant I was very mature. This is hilarious to me partly because I haven’t changed a bit. I always seem to feel like I’m getting old. Even at three, apparently.
Probably my mother. She’s the kind of person that has the power to keep an incredibly level head. My father is the one to talk to about anything complex, which is something I’m very grateful to have inherited. But my mother has the kind of mental calm that can reduce the messiness of life. I’d like to steal some of that assuredness that things aren’t as bad as they seem in the moment. She’ll just tell me to eat or sleep or take a walk or clean my room. And you know what? It works more often than not. Don’t tell her that, though.
I think when people irritate me it tends to be more on me and my mood than it is on them so I don’t think I can name any that would deserve it.
In the summer of 2021 I accompanied my two grandparents -who are absolute heroes doing that in their nineties- to Iceland to visit my aunt (who lives there) and watch the live volcano (Fagradalsfjall) erupting. One evening my aunt Marrit and I walked up the mountains to one side of the volcano and we stayed there until the middle of the night. We sat up on that mountain for a while and then walked down until we were just a few meters away from the lava. It was dark at that point and the lava was bright orange and yellow through the blackness of everything else, you could smell it, feel the heat, hear the cracking of the stone, see streams and waterfalls of lava, the parts that cooled off like black sheets being moved on the river, wherever it moved over the land the moss smoked and burned. Since it was so late there were only a few people left and it was like being on another planet.
The second time my grandparents treated us to a trip to the volcano in a helicopter which was also seriously spectacular because we could look right into the crater. I don’t think I’ll forget that holiday any time soon.
First I need to say that there are too many to choose from. But for the sake of picking one… Avatar: The Last Airbender, the nickelodeon cartoon (not the movie, The Last Airbender, that was pretty disastrous). Anyone who’s seen it will agree wholeheartedly that it’s a great show. Anyone who hasn’t will now think I have the tastes of a child. Both conclusions would be about equally correct.
I’ve never listened to the radio much. I know that’s a bit strange as a musician, but I can’t come up with any radio show that has been relevant to me.
Lately it’s my own variation on a vegan mushroom and beans pasta. My housemate gave me the recipe for it, but I, in my usual fashion, did it sort-of-from-memory often enough that it’s now just a nod to the recipe and more my own concoction.
Bagels & Beans. It’s a Dutch franchise and it’s less of a restaurant-restaurant and more of a place you’d get lunch. They have the most delicious toasted bagels with fantastic toppings and lovely smoothies, different hot chocolates and teas.
The last book I finished was Wise Child by Monica Furlong. It’s a children’s book about a girl living in a Scottish village that gets adopted by their resident witch. It seems a little silly as a concept but it’s actually quite a mindful story about a life full of hard work, kindness and laughter. It’s got long descriptions of preparing medicinal herbs, making food, eating, cleaning, telling stories, and thoughtful explanations about why these things are a joyful part of life. My parents and I used to listen to the Dutch audiobook in the car heading to the alps to go camping. I think the story will forever be stuck in me as an example of the kind of life that’s worth living.
I really like “Good Omens” by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, it’s hilarious. I don’t really have a favourite, not even an objective best book. But that one is one I reread regularly and is always fun.
I bought my friend Lucas’ EP back in the Netherlands called “Esthetiek”, which translates roughly to “Aestetics”. He’s a great Dutch artist. I’ve met a lot of fantastic people in my Bachelor’s degree. I’ve had Anna Sylvia’s EP “Paradigm” on a loop lately, as well as Kuzko’s new single “Penelope”. My producer Kees Braam’s band Certain Animals has a host of great songs. I’m also really proud to have worked together with Dragonfruit a couple of years ago on a song called “Gears of the Giant Machine” for which I co wrote the lyrics.
This varies but I think I’m going to go with “Afloat” by Anna Rune. You know how the best music just kind of understands you like you wrote it yourself? This song does that for me. I love the lyric “I do not want to reason, I need to feel it in my bones.” For someone like me, who tends to get lost all the time trying to reason her way through life, those lyrics are like a talisman. But the lyrics are just words without the life the song blows into them. I once heard the phrase “Music is the heart’s native language” which has just been so true for me. Music has been my way of communicating, or even just expressing things that I don’t know how to explain otherwise. To then find other people doing the same and relating so personally to it is always really strange but meaningful.
Vienna Teng.
Night owl. But since I’ve been waking up early I’ve been trying not to give into my night-owl nature.
I think it was in the process of recording my album Spring. I’d asked lots of instrumentalists to play on it so Kees Braam, my producer and I spent two weeks recording everything needed. It was November 2019 and it was bitterly cold and the studio would take a while to warm up and we lived mostly on tea and the cookies I kept baking and bringing around. I remember just thinking that I’d actually organised for all these people to come and play.
And I was proud of myself that I’d made it and so grateful that people were putting in their time and effort for my project. I think it was also the faith that these people were putting into my music, and how seriously they were taking their part in it. There was a solidarity there and a respect that I loved and that I was proud to have earned, and to see my music expand in that way was wonderful.
Yikes, I’d say spendthrift. I’d love not to be but I have three weaknesses: The first is good food, organic if possible. The second is thrifting clothes. The third is art supplies. Since I’ve started selling some of my paintings I’ve been able to justify the last one to myself a bit better, but I’ll still regularly buy things I don’t need. I don’t spend money in big chunks. I’ll think twice before buying something really pricy, or even if just the total amount gets too high, but I do let small expenses get out of hand sometimes. I don’t spend more than I have, but I spend more money than I would like to.
More and better cycling paths. A very cliche thing to say for a Dutch person, maybe, but it’s simply true. I don’t do well with busy traffic in general and if there’s no proper cycling paths it’s just extra dangerous. In the Netherlands everyone cycles and it shows in the infrastructure. I’d love to cycle even because it’s just a cheap, environmentally friendly way to get around faster, but in Cork it seems like it would be an extreme sport for me to do so. Also, barring that more pedestrian-friendly traffic lights.
Dancing. Singing randomly. Music in general. Late-night conversations. Inside jokes. Not so-inside jokes. Stories. Learning things. Making things. Friends. Family.
As a kind and insightful person. Not sure I am, yet, but hopefully I will have a lot of time until I have to be remembered that way so I can learn to be better at it.
At the moment almost all my time is spent in rehearsals since I’m doing musical directing and live accompaniment for The Tempest, which the third year drama class at CSM is putting on. I kind of fell into doing it by accident when auditing a scriptwriting class that was taught by the director, Johnny Hanrahan. Getting involved in this project was one of the best decisions I’ve made since I moved to Cork. It’s kept me composing music at a steady pace, it introduced me to a class of welcoming, passionate people that are always full of stories and ideas.
This project has also allowed me to be a part of telling a story in collaboration and has given me a lot of insight into how stories even come alive. That and the sheer amount of ways there are to interpret them. The fact that I could have read through The Tempest and not understood the story until I saw it acted out was a revelation to me. The Tempest as performed by this cast is hilarious and threatening, playful and solemn, prosaic and poetic.
I’ve not often felt so at home in a project as I have felt here and I’m really proud of myself and everyone involved to see it coming together into a completely unique experience of Shakespeare. In the show I’ll be playing and singing some compositions I wrote especially and joining in on the live sound score we’ve been writing in collaboration.
The Tempest will be performed from March 1st to 5th at Cork School of Music.
App?
