NIELS VAN GOGH
DJ / Producer / Remixer
House / Techno / Rave

contact: niels@nielsvangogh.de
Check out the official websites !

Pronounced "Why" - "Are" - "Es" Jersey. Up And Coming Entertainment/Music Mogul - YRS Jerzy -

ILSE knows first-hand what it means to hold on steadfast to her dreams. Born without her left arm, she overcame the odds and made her way to center stage, enchanting listeners with her voice and music and touching their innermost emotions. Drawing from childhood experiences in Belgium and her new life in New York City, ILSE sings about loss, courage, self-affirmation, attraction, romance, fear, and hope. 

Music has always been her biggest passion, it runs through her veins. ILSE’s musical roots originate in the music of her father, a former bass player. Initially, it was his love of rock music that inspired ILSE, but the sound and spirit of soul music pushed her to find her own unique musical path. On the way, ILSE quickly discovered her passion for bearing her soul before live audiences and this passion is what makes the stage ILSE’s new place to call home.

After majoring in Psychology, ILSE moved to New York to pursue her dream. ILSE struggled during her first years in New York City, slowly finding her footing despite poverty and rounds of rejection. She gained experience in regular performances at open-mics, where she has shared the stage with Lana Del Rey (formerly known as Lizzy Grant). ILSE’s commitment paid off one day when she was approached by Michael Douglas after a show in Manhattan’s Sugar Bar. Soon after, she had her first sold out show in the legendary Joe’s Pub, The Public Theatre, a venue from the “Best of New York” list (where artists such as Amy Winehouse, Elvis Costello, Adele, Lady Gaga and many others have played). 

The I Am Human debut LP is a spectacular representation of ILSE’s winding journey: a woman-takes-on-world capsule odyssey and very much a small wonder - a transfixing amalgam of alchemic quality: feather-delicate yet diamond-hard; imbued with achingly vulnerable streaks still insists on tough-as-nails, self-worth configuration.  The album offers a unique and multifaceted coverage of the human experience delivered in a fresh and bold sound: featuring both up-tempo hit singles boasting state-of-the-art production gadgetry alongside earth shattering timeless ballads with piano and strings. In between, this profound and non-compromising creation catches its breath with a poetic intermezzo and climates in an epic full size orchestra.  

This fascinating fusion - bruised, throbbing human and feminine emotions delivered in a confident, almost swaggering sparkly lucid sounds and musical production – is well mastered by boldface names behind the consoles in the likes of Grammy-nominated Producer/Musician Joshua Valleau (John Legend, James Blake, BBC), Columbia Records, Sony UK Composer/Producer Sebastiaan Vandevoorde (Moonlight Matters, Arches, Villa; remixed artists such as Adele, Lana Del Rey, Ellie Goulding, Moby), Violinist/Arranger/Composer Juliette Jones of Jules & The Dirty Collective (Florence + The Machine, Pharrell Williams, Aretha Franklin, Janelle Monae, J.Cole, Nicki Minaj) and even Grammy winning producer Ricky Key. 

With full-page newspaper and exclusive magazine interviews, appearances on national radio stations and a growing presence on television and social media, ILSE is loudly and proudly making people pay attention. 

"Ilse Gevaert displays a talent for turning negatives into unlikely positives." - BBC NEWS 

"The Lady is a Champ" -PENTHOUSE MAGAZINE 

“Singer-songwriter Ilse Gevaert could be about to create a musical earthquake not managed by a Belgian since her countryman Adolphe Sax invented the saxophone in 1841. Her forthcoming album I Am Human could be the best biggest thing to have come out of Belgium after the women’s tennis rivalry between Justine Henin and Kim Clijsters.” SPALDING GUARDIAN, UK

With its bass-heavy, lavishly cinematic sound and undeniable charm, ILSE’s music dances between musical eras while pointing towards the future. Hers is music made for everyone—music made for you to feel. ILSE’s music is made to bring people together.

I write myself into songs. So you can know more about me than you'd really ever want to know just by reading the lyrics. Connect a few dots, it's all in there…

My mom is a piano teacher. When I was three years old, I climbed up on the piano bench and started playing by ear the song that she had just finished teaching to her student. I guess she kinda flipped out.

So, I begged her to teach me. I woke up at 5:00 a.m. and practiced for hours every day. I lived to perform, I loved to compete. I was that little pianist kid you see on TV, whose legs don't reach the pedals, playing a twenty-minute concerto accompanied by a symphony orchestra. I always loved everything about being on a stage. It was just in my blood.

And the music was in my head. Big and full, with harmony and counterpoint kinda like a film score written on the fly for my daily life.  I'd compose melodies to the accompaniment of the "notes" of the brakes on the school bus, car horns and all the other sounds around me. It never crossed my mind that there wasn't a symphony banging around in everyone else's head too.

By the way, did I tell you we didn't have a TV? Never did. Not allowed. I am the oldest of eight children, and let me tell you: EIGHT KIDS + ZERO TV = INSANITY. You can imagine that as the oldest of eight, I was like the second mom. So I often joke, although it's not at all a joke because it's ridiculously true, that at age ten, I had four hours of piano to practice, five children to take care of, seven loads of laundry to do and dinner to get on the table before dad got home. Not much room for anything else.

So how did I get here from there, typing the story of where I come from as if somebody's going to care…? If I'm honest, I'll tell you I'm jealous of the other stories… like the one about somebody's daddy twirling her around in the air to the music of the Rolling Stones and the Beatles when she was just a little girl, and her momma telling her she was a superstar. My daddy beat the metronome on my head with a wooden spoon as I practiced the Pathetique Sonata by Beethoven, and I wasn't allowed to listen to the Beatles or the Stones. That music was considered a worldly distraction. I had to be focused.

But being forbidden to listen to the radio only made me want it more. So, my naughty crime was sneaking "listens" of the forbidden music. And that's when I realized I was more about rock than Rachmaninoff. I'd lay awake at night in my bed writing my secret songs. I'd silently sing about a girl who was suffocating, who wasn't really alive... who was something she couldn't admit to, was stuffed in boxes, who needed be seen, who felt like a mistake, worse, like a poison.

I don't want to get too intense here, we're just getting to know each other. But I'm intense. And I've been in dark places. And the music saved me, pushed me, made me free.

But, I think artists ache. It's a requirement. It's what inspires the art in the first place. It starts down low, like a throb, a heartbeat. It gets louder and louder, it beats and screams and pounds on our inner walls until we give it air and let it out. My piano was where I found my identity.  I disappeared inside myself every time I played. It was my high. It still is. And it means everything to me that you listen...it always will.

lv, scarlett

kind·ness [ kīndnəss ] - the practice of being or the tendency to be sympathetic and compassionate

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