Dutch sound artist/percussionist Etienne Nillesen is a minimalist, favoring simplicity and keeping only what is essential. His solo work is built around two specially tuned snare drums, set in a precise microtonal relationship determined by the drum’s own acoustics. Rather than rhythm or attack, his music is about the relationship between pitches: the overtones, interference patterns, and harmonies that arise between them.

He has mastered a unique approach to tone production from the repetitive circular motion around a drum head, resulting in a multi-layered harmonic structure. No one has as thoroughly explored this particular method of harmonic and overtone production via snare drum, making Nillesen a singular artist, and lone pioneer of the craft.

The music is patient, set in motion through nuanced differences in intonation, pressure, and contact. The sound continuously reveals itself. Forms emerge from what happens between the pitches, the space, and the active listener; each performance is a communal experience. It’s a rich, continuously shifting sound world, heard – and felt – differently, depending on where and how one listens.

Nillesen has released two acclaimed solo albums. On en (Sofa, 2024) he delves into the possibilities of sound production from a single artisan snare. With TWEE (Sofa, 2026), he takes things a step further with the addition of a second snare, doubling his range, and creating even more harmonic layers. In his liner notes, Nate Wooley writes: “The stories that Etienne Nillesen asks his snare drum to tell us are a positive force, and this recording is proof of an incredible possibility: that a human and an object can become partners in a search for something perfect and indestructible, something ancient.”

His work has been presented at Ruhrtriennale, Gare du Nord Basel, Forum Neue Musik Luzern, Meakusma, and nyMusikk Bergen, among numerous other contemporary music festivals and concert series across Europe, North America, and South America. Supported by grants from Musikfonds, the Ministry of Culture and Science NRW, and the Art Foundation of NRW, he is also a faculty member at ArtEZ University of the Arts.

TWEE out now on Sofa Music

TWEE (2026) Released on SOFA Music in co-production with Deutschlandfunk. Recorded at Deutschlandfunk Kammermusiksaal, Cologne.

“What one hears is a long stream of iridescent beauty.” — Martin Hufner, nmz

EN (2024) Released on SOFA Music in co-production with Deutschlandfunk. Recorded at Deutschlandfunk Kammermusiksaal, Cologne.

“[…] once we let Nillesen cast his spell, an entire world opens up.”
— Peter Margasak, Nowhere Street