Alfred den Ouden 17-6-1947, Dordrecht, The Netherlands.
Since 1959 infected by the folk virus by LP's that his big brother brought in from Canada and the USA, Kingston trio, Harry Belafonte and the like. From 1964, the ball started to roll completely after hearing from Dylan, Donovan, Baez, Lonny Donegan, and many others. A live concert by the great Pete Seeger was the deciding factor to sing and play himself. Musical wanderings and encounters with British folkies led to the music making a living. So in 1969 ended up in Flanders to end up in the Westhoek via Ostend, Antwerp and Kortrijk, Heuvelland, Reningelst, Ypres and nowadays Vlamertinge.
In 1974 he started his own folk club in Dranouter, de Zon, from which initiative the Folkfestival Dranouter was created in 1975, of which he was organizer and programmer for 12 years.
After 20 years of working mainly with culinary and organizational matters, the folk microbe surfaced again in the 1990s, which resulted in a number of productions and recordings.
Active with the Trio Alfred den Ouden since 2018.
Discography: 1971 Alfred den Ouden - (Decca). 1972 Alfred den Ouden 2 - (Decca), 1974 Traditional folk music from French Flanders. (Parsival) 1999 The mists of time (own texts and translations)
Joint productions: 1972 Festival in Vesdun, 1 song. 1973 Festival in Pons, 2 songs. 1978 War will never bring peace 1985 - 1986 The Yslandsuite and What a sailor is already suffering. 1992 We died in hell, they called it Passchendael. 1998 Songs of peace as a singer and composer and Swigshift and friends (2 songs)
Gérald Ryckeboer is born in Dunkirk, in French Flanders, north of France. He had first a “pop jazz“ and “english folk“ period on the guitar, his first instrument, and later “felt in love“ with irish music. Then this passion had been extended to other traditional musics, especially Flemish music, which revival had just start a few years before in France … and consequently to other instruments too, as the bagpipes. That made him play within several bands for concerts and bals : Delavier-Ryckeboer duet, Hempson (ancient irish and schottisch music), Klauwaerts, Marieke and Bart, Blootland and later Rococo Rijsel Trio (music from french Flanders), Vents Contraires (folk dancing), also as a singer’s and raconteur’s musician (Ghislain Gouwy, Jacques Yvart, …), and also for theatre and tale performances. All of that lead him to practice 6 kinds of bagpipes, to singing, to play irish whistle, bouzouki, fiddle and for occasions, he also adds computers and sequencers to his music, as a come back to the electric guitars of his beginning.
He teaches his instruments in music school and at home in north of France.
In 2003 Lode Bucsan began to learn the hurdy-gurdy instrument at the Ypres academy. Under the supervision of Jaak Devuyst and later Paul Garriau, he finished his studies as a laureate with great distinction.
Since 2010 he has been a professional musician and a welcome guest on stages at home and abroad. As a teacher he is sometimes invited to give workshops in Belgium and abroad, he also teaches at the academy of Gooik.
After doing 2 masterclasses in Central France with Patrick Bouffard, he specialized in energetic danceable folk. Lode's musical perspective is very broad and focuses not only on traditional folk, in which he has many projects, but also on ambient, rock, drone and experimental music.
At the moment he does this with the following groups: Trio Alfred Den Ouden, BéNéLo , Trio RCB, Demenklang, Les vielles qui Dansent and Duo Bucsan/Gielen.
Lode plays on a hurdy-gurdy built in 1890 by Gilbert Nigout from Jenzat, Central France.
