VanWyck & Reyer Zwart

The enchanting alt-folk songs of Amsterdam singer-songwriter VanWyck are sometimes sparse and intimate, sometimes darkly dominant. With her warm, earthy voice, rich lyrics and enchanting melodies she weaves a tapestry of stories. Stories about everyday struggling women, or mythical stories that wander through our history. About a drowning girl, a whispering garbage man, a raging goddess or a lost alcoholic. With every listen, more layers present themselves in her songs.

“I need songwriting to understand things, to find words for things, to search the corners of my mind that can’t be reached in other ways. It’s also what I enjoy most, this playing with melodies and words, this mysterious twisting and stringing. This thing that can’t be pinned down.”

With five internationally acclaimed albums, VanWyck’s intriguing oeuvre has drawn comparisons to Leonard Cohen, Natalie Merchant and PJ Harvey. But it’s when she performs live on stage with her band that a whole new register opens up for her music: “Performing is an exchange with the audience. It creates a kind of synergy, you’re elevated together.”

In 2015, VanWyck released her first EP, Tanned Legs, to international acclaim. Her debut album, An Average Woman (2018), was released on her own Maiden Name Records. The record was praised by the Dutch music press as one of the best releases by a native artist in years.

Her second album Molten Rock (2019) again wandered between dark folk, lush Americana and alternative rock. “I wanted to create something that could hold multiple truths, something that was both vulnerable and strong, that contained happiness and sadness, silence and abundance. So much of what is thrown at us today is one-dimensional, but in life we are always balancing between conflicting views.”

After her first theater tour was canceled due to the pandemic, VanWyck changed course and released a third album of intimate, acoustic songs called God is in the Detour (2020). It received a 4-star review in MOJO magazine (which called the album “a beauty”) and has been streamed more than two million times.

VanWyck’s fourth album, The Epic Tale of the Stranded Man (2022), was released on iconic Dutch label Excelsior Recordings. The twelve tracks are interwoven both lyrically and harmonically. Together they tell a story about a man haunted by a dark past and a woman who tries to save him. The album received a 4-star review from MOJO magazine and led to performances throughout Europe.

VanWyck's fifth album, Dust Chaser, was released in September 2024. VanWyck explores new sonic atmospheres and infuses her songs with influences from desert rock, blues and psychedelia. Together with her extended band she brought a new energy to the stage. In 2025 they play a new theater tour, festival shows and extra club shows.