Corjan de Raaf turns Mysteries into Music

by Willem Jongeneelen
BN/De Stem 8 September 2009

In his new music project, Corjan de Raaf is going international. The song “The Book of Love” named after the novel of the same name is a single the singer/composer wrote in a co-operation with American bestselling author Kathleen McGowan.

INTERVIEW ‘I write from my emotions, I’ve done so all my life’

HALSTEREN – In his daily work he runs a consulting company in Amsterdam with a couple of partners, advising banks about their business – even during a credit crisis. When he is back home in the village of Halsteren, he fully devotes himself to his two hobbies. The word passions is perhaps more appropriate. “On the one hand there’s my love for Treasure Hunting which has gone completely out of hand. Accompanied by my dad I have been making many journeys through the years to investigate the stories that are for example behind The Da Vinci Code on the spot in southern France. It’s an endless task. Over 500 books have been written about this theme. It’s not religion that drives me. Personally I am a believer in ‘there-must-be-something-ism’. I possess a healthy historical curiosity and I am just very interested to find out truths behind mysteries. With a number of English friends who are just as fanatical as I am, I publish the material on a number of websites on which we have also created a platform for the people who write about the mysteries.”

His second passion is music. He got his first keyboard at the age of 12 and has been writing his own songs ever since. This resulted in a concept album named ‘Diablo’ that opened a number of doors for the musician who had bands like Duran Duran, Marillion and A-ha has his main inspirations. However it never led to the much desired big contract. He played in regional bands for a while like Go for the Groupies and the 70s band The John Holmes Gang. De Raaf finished his school on his hometown of Bergen op Zoom, studied in Paris for a while and worked in a London City bank for a number of years. His passion music was parked on the side for a while. “It just couldn’t pay my mortgage. Around my 30th birthday I got into a divorce procedure. I had to vent those emotions in music. I write from my emotions. Always did, always will do.” The result is a Dutch language album called “Scenes”. You can call it a kind of concept album around the themes of love, saying goodbye and crawling up again. The sometimes theatrical sounding songs sound fantastic, have been meticulously produced and De Raaf’s flawless voice often reaches dizzying heights.

Corjan de Raaf uses only the latest technology. He calls himself a programmer rather than a traditional instrument player. In 2005 he surprised the world by launching the first single on a USB memory stick. Today he primarily offers his music through iTunes, Amazon and Napster as downloadable music. “I have made the switch to the English language now and try to combine my two hobbies. The mystery websites draw thousands of visitors each day. On top of that I have a good relationship with author Kathleen McGowan. She was very impressed by my song and will actively promote it. The lady, who wrote The Expected One and The Book of Love, has sold millions of copies of her books and that can only benefit me. Of course I want my music to be heard even though I sometimes have ambivalent feelings about that. On the one hand I have a message to share but at the same time it is scarily personal. The latter makes it hard to share my music with people I know well sometimes. It is easier for me when someone in Taiwan downloads my songs than to play them for a colleague at work”.

Corjan de Raaf demands very high quality standards from himself. The co-operation with McGowan will get a follow-up at an album’s length, consisting only of songs based on mystery books. The second new song is already there: City of Secrets, after Patrice Chaplin’s book of the same name. “That author also writes scripts for movies, there’s a chance this book will get a film version and it has already been suggested that mys song could be part of the soundtrack. That’s still a vague possibility, but the positive attention gives me enormous drive and energy to continue this project”.

Corjan mystery websites are www.rlcresearch.com en www.rennessence.com.

This interview appeared in Dutch newspaper BN De Stem on 8th september 2009 | copyright 2009 BN De Stem en Willem Jongeneelen, translated by Corjan de Raaf