Here you can listen the Bali Suite played by Alfred, the work is not available on scores yet. We are working on it.

The title, Bali Suite, is because during our vacations on the Island of Bali I started to compose the guitar music which you will be able to hear during the movie.

The suite has 6 pieces and has a duration of 19 minutes and 20 seconds.

It is a so-called slow movie, an overall look of images, sounds, impressions of the island, Coks, my wife and I Alfred Feenstra had the luck to be for four weeks on the island and live in an amazing house with no walls in an equal amazing garden (start of the movie shows it with the music of the first 4 pieces of the Bali suite as background music) all the rest of the movie are shots from excursions and happenings, ceremonies and events, impressions of the people and their habits of life full of traditions.

Bali Suite | First Part

1:18:44

Bali Suite | Second Part

0:47:47

Bali Suite | Third Part

0:07:13

Read Andrew Williams’ review 

Andrew Williams
Wed, Oct 18, 1:03 PM (4 days ago)

to me

Well! First of all, this felt like a real privilege, and thank you for letting me listen. I have so many things to say about it but I don’t want to sound like some sort of all-knowing authority.

First, I was struck by how well you play – the performance and recording are both excellent.

It wasn’t at all what I expected, in that it didn’t sound Balinese or Far-Eastern. And it also sounded more dark, to my ears, than «holiday-ish».

In the first two movements it felt like you were liberating your inner Gitano. From the first it has a slow, brooding, intense flamenco feel, and plenty of fireworks and flourishes. There is so much in it, you can pick up little bits and pieces here and there of the Paco de Lucia-style jazz-influenced flamenco with some gorgeous discord – then suddenly you hear a little Villa Lobos sneaking in, and in the section with the melody in the basses it feels definitely latin. It’s beautiful – and the final chord is a killer.

I thought I heard a lot more of the flamenco influenced right hand in the second movement and it’s still in quite dark territory. There are great melodies and some stunning contrasts – I loved the bit where an unharmonised melody in the high registers comes in with an almost Aranjuez-like theme.

Then we come to the third movement, and it is more classical/romantic in feel with its repeated rhythmic structure. This would be a great stand-alone piece for its immediate melody, lovely harmonies and modulations. But from a more extrovert playing style you are focusing in on a more reflective and intimate approach where the focus is purely on the music, not the technical skills of the player.

That process is complete in the fourth movement where there is no decoration at all and nothing virtuosic – it’s stripped down and everything depends on the harmonic/melodic relationships in a simple repeated pattern. It’s beautifully done, I loved it.

I don’t understand how you could have let this go without publishing: guitarists will want to play it and I’m sure many would take up individual movements of it too. I don’t envy you trying to reconstruct it without the musical notation though.

Thank you again, that was a real pleasure for me
Andrew