The sparkle in his eye balances the weight of his words. 'It's been quite a year.' Wouter Hamel, whose first two albums, 'Hamel' and 'Nobody's Tune' captured hearts in his native Netherlands and spread like wildfire throughout Europe, Japan, and Korea, is back with his new record, 'Lohengrin', after a long and winding road full of surprises; not all of them pleasant. 'This year has been one full of adventure.' Being confronted with the painful breakup of a 9-year relationship is hard enough. However, when this happens in the same week as the sudden departure of one of your trusted band members, then it just might become too much. ...show more

The sparkle in his eye balances the weight of his words. 'It's been quite a year.' Wouter Hamel, whose first two albums, 'Hamel' and 'Nobody's Tune' captured hearts in his native Netherlands and spread like wildfire throughout Europe, Japan, and Korea, is back with his new record, 'Lohengrin', after a long and winding road full of surprises; not all of them pleasant. 'This year has been one full of adventure.' Being confronted with the painful breakup of a 9-year relationship is hard enough. However, when this happens in the same week as the sudden departure of one of your trusted band members, then it just might become too much.

For Wouter, however, these challenges were faced head on, and he's emerged stronger and more determined than ever. Hamel even embraced the opportunity of producing his own album for the very first time, so yet another break up, that with his longtime producer, Benny Sings, was also in the cards. 'For me it was a huge period of starting over. I had lost my partner.

I had lost my pianist. I had to be my own producer. I knew that I had to dig deep and start again, on lots of levels.' The ideas started flowing during the promotion of the second album 'Nobody's Tune', when Hamel decided to take some time to write in Paris. 'I wanted to escape the rat race for a while.' The writing process continued in the summer of 2010. ...show less