Music is also a great hobby of Steven Roberts, commercial Director of Rijk Zwaan Australia and Business Manager Oceania. He plays the violin well in the Irish and Scottish tradition with great passion and dedication.
In the Corona days Steven composed a melody line and with his musical friends recorded a demo using online tools. He sent this to me along with his reaction to the song 'Australian Sunrise'.
It really was an original melody line, which he played as a slow reel. We agreed that I would try to write lyrics for it. And so began a rather long but also very interesting search for the new song 'Dobell Drive'.
Once the key and slightly faster tempo had been determined, I proposed the lyrics and composed a chorus. Together with Laurens van Wessel we came up with the arrangement, with Joke de Jong filling in the violin part in the studio with a traditional Celtic feel to it.
Dobell Drive is the street where Steven lives with his family, named after the famous Australian portrait and landscape artist Sir William Dobell. It is located in the small town of Wangi Wangi on the shores of Lake Macquarie, 130kms north of Sydney in Australia.
The words point out that we increasingly do not know whether something is true or real ‘Is it fake or is it real'. When you go out into the beautiful countryside, with friends or alone, you know for sure that everything is real ‘One thing is sure, nothing is fake'. The area around this lake is indescribably beautiful ‘The bush is natural, open and real. Freedom and joy is what I feel, on Lake Macquarie, with the wind from the sea'.
Steven was immediately enthusiastic about the demo we sent him. After some adjustments to the lyrics, we came to the conclusion that, despite the greatest imaginable distance (Fijnaart and Wangi Wangi), we had created a new song together. A unique musical moment of happiness.
This song will also be on the new lp/cd 'Journey'.