Toasaves is a Belgian music collective with a fascination for archaic Flemish folk songs and their relationship to early music and Eastern music. Toasaves is written phonetically and means “home ports” in the Antwerp dialect. The band was founded in early 2021 by oud player and artistic director Tristan Driessens. It brings together nine musicians from Belgium, France, the Netherlands, Spain and Cyprus, each with a broad artistic background and expertise.

On the first album Zwerver (wanderer in Dutch), Toasaves starts from the compositions and the Groot Liedboek by Wannes van de Velde (1937-2008), the singer-songwriter who blew new life into the oldest surviving ballads and litanies in his home port of Antwerp. Tristan Driessens wrote new arrangements of both anonymous medieval songs and original work by Van de Velde. It goes without saying that an eclectic dialogue with the East, which runs like a red thread through Driessens’ career, was not missing. It ties in with the nomadic spirit and openness of Wannes van de Velde, and reveals and reinforces the primal power of the early music repertoires.

Zwerver was awarded in the category “Best Album” at Flanders Folk Awards 2024.

THE MUSICIANS

• Tristan Driessens (BE) – oud, lavta, vocals, arrangements, artistic direction
• Miriam Encinas Laffitte (ES) – dilruba, recorders, fiddle, daf, pandero cuadrado, bendir, santur
• Raphaël De Cock (BE) – vocals, flemish bagpipes, uilleann pipes, mouth harp
• Harald Bauweraerts (BE) – hurdy gurdy, vocals
• Michalis Kouloumis (CY) – violin
• Eugénie De Mey (BE) – vocals
• Michaël Grébil Liberg (BE) – bow cistre, Corsican cetera, medieval lute, fiddle, Afghan rebab, singing
• Pierre Hamon (FR) – medieval flutes, tambourine and bansuri
• Dick van der Harst (NL) – bodhran, pandero cuadrado, tambourine, bells and sticks

TRACKS

1. 1. Als ik zou sterven
   2. Sanderjon en de boerin
   3. La tierche estampie roial
   4. De Zwerver
   5. Het Regent zeer
   6. Het Daghet in den Oosten
   7. ‘t Zoud een meiske gaan om wyn
   8. Ik sta al jaren in de regen
   9. Romance de Isabel
   10. Belicha Istanpitta
   11. Onder de lindeboom groene
   12. Cypriotische dans

GET THE ALBUM

Via Muziekpublique

• By postal delivery: order on our website
• At our office (Rue des Chevaliers 4, 1050 Ixelles) from Tuesday to Friday between 10.30-13.00 and 15-18.00, or during concerts.

Record shops

• In good record shops in Belgium, Netherlands, Luxemburg, Germany, Austria, Switzerland

Online

• Bandcamp
• Listen the album on streaming platforms by following this link