Common ground: 1970s improvised music as part of a cross-genre Dutch ensemble culture

This article focuses on the way in which jazz and Western art music in the Netherlands during the 1970s were intertwined, both social and musically, and how alliances between their avant-gardes (Improvising Musicians and Contemporary Musicians) contributed to what came to be known as Dutch ensemble culture. While Dutch ‘ensemble culture’ has been mostly explored from the perspective of changes within the singular musical system of Western art music, this article proposes a more inclusive model of viewing post-war music culture in the Netherlands. By juxtaposing the developments of Dutch improvised music with the local ensemble culture, it demonstrates how cross-genre collaboration in the Netherlands generated, facilitated and directed social and musical changes within musico-cultural landscape in the Netherlands.