I. Youth 
II. A ‘Family’ Member
III. Hacktivism
IV. Collateral Murder
V. Wanted
VI. Contained
VII. A Tent in an Embassy
VIII. Solitude
IX. Arrest
X. Isolation
XI. Finale: Breaking Free

The turbulent events surrounding Australian journalist, former hacker and Internet activist Julian Assange, best known for founding the whistleblowing website WikiLeaks, have been on my mind a lot. At the time the composition that is now before you began to take shape in my mind, Assange had been in solitary confinement in His Majesty’s Prison Belmarsh, near London, for five years, 23 hours a day all alone, even though he had not been formally convicted of anything. He had only been charged with alleged “crimes” such as disclosing “sensitive material” (a – highly inflated – charge of sexual assault was dropped long ago).

I know a little bit about life in a His Majesty’s Prison: in HMP Bronzefield, another prison near London, a dear friend of mine, Sabine McNeill, was detained during 4½ years, also as punishment for whistleblowing. I corresponded with her a lot, and I also composed music for her, in the form of a setting of her favorite poem Das Leben das ich selbst gewählt (The Life I Chose Myself) (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VVCU_So2mxI). Unlike Sabine however, Assange was put in a locked ward at HMP Belmarsh, a ward reserved for the toughest criminals, not surprisingly called Hell Wing. The manner in which Assange was punished can thus be called disproportionate, to say the least.

For inspiration, I read the book Guilty Of Journalism, The Political Case Against Julian Assange by young American investigative journalist Kevin Gosztola, as well as the 2011 Unauthorized Biography on Assange. This material, supplemented by various videos and articles that can be found on the Internet, gave me the idea of writing a composition consisting of a theme, followed by a number of short movements that, with some imagination, could be seen as “variations,” concluding with a fugue. This is a recipe I have used before, first for my 2012 Vita Aeterna Variations for Brass Band. For this reason, and also because Assange was imprisoned in England, where there are many brass bands, I decided to write the work for brass band.

I submitted my idea to the Frisian brass band Soli Brass from Leeuwarden and there it was received positively. With the help of this brass band, I subsequently applied for a so-called Werkbijdrage Muziekauteur (Work Grant for Music Authors) from the Dutch Fund for the Performing Arts, as to be able to pay my bills while working at the composition. Unfortunately, the application was rejected, with the main argument being: In spite of the subject being special and of the international distribution, the plan, according to the committee, offers too few starting points to inspire confidence in a distinctive result.

Until now, such a rejection meant that I could not write the work in question, since composing is my main source of income. This time, however, I decided to write the composition anyway: I had already started, and my resolve was strengthened by the confidence that Soli Brass continued to have in the project, despite the lack of confidence expressed by the Fund for the Performing Arts with the above and other arguments. Finally, the feeling that I was right to write this work was further strengthened by the fact that the moment Assange’s release hit the news coincided exactly with the moment I began composing the Finale! Consequently, this part has been titled: Breaking Free.

The result has become a composition consisting of eleven short interlocking movements, each highlighting a facet of Assange’s life and work, and centering on an idée-fixe motif derived from the letters of the word ASSANGE:(E flat in English is called Es (pronounced as S) in Dutch (and German))

The various movements finally culminate in a grand apotheosis in the form of a fugue, in which motifs from preceding movements return. Here is an overview of the movements:

I. Youth. Assange’s not exactly everyday youth in Queensland, Australia. The theme presented here, which is the starting point for variations that follow, is based on the Australian folk song The Overlander:

About Overlanding, the following can be found on Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overlanding): Historically, “overlanding” is an Australian term to denote the droving of livestock over very long distances to open up new country or to take livestock to market far from grazing grounds. And, a little further on in the article: Overlanding (…) is getting ever more popular, (…) with routes crossing some intensely difficult terrain.

II. A ‘Family’ Member. Little is known about the period of Assange’s life from age 8 to 16. According to the Unauthorised Biography, during this time, he and his mother lived as refugees and were forced to move again and again: ‘My mother became involved with a person (…) of the Anne Hamilton-Byrne cult in Australia, and we kept getting tracked down (…) and having to leave very quickly to a new city (…)’, until the 16-year-old Assange finally confronts the pursuer and summons him ‘to fuck off.’ Other sources tell different stories. Be that as it may, it seems to be a time when the aforementioned cult, called The Family, played an important and somewhat dark role.

III. Hacktivism. As a teenager, Assange develops a fondness for the fairy tale world of computers and learns the art of hacking. With a musical nod to an ancient Microsoft Windows Startup Sound.

IV. Collateral Murder. A musical painting of what is seen in the video that brought Assange and WikiLeaks worldwide fame: an incident in which U.S. soldiers in Iraq shoot unarmed civilians, including children, from a helicopter, acting as if they were engaged in a computer game. (An abridged video with explanation can be seen here: WikiLeaks video ‘shows US attack’: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UaqY12VHFv4.) Central to this movement is the Iraqi national anthem Gulli Ya Hilu (Tell me, oh angel):

Tell me, oh sweet one, where did God take you from, in order to put you onto my path?
The wound in my heart has been stored with your torture deep inside it.

V. Wanted. The U.S. government accuses Assange of disclosing secret “sensitive” information. Accompanied by sounds from the Battle Hymn of the Republic, he is hunted down in London. Sweden (the music now features the Swedish national anthem) joins the manhunt, due to charges of (alleged) rape:

Then England (God Save the Queen) also joins the manhunt. But then, just in time, looms the building of the Ecuadorian embassy, rendered in the music as Ecuador’s national anthem:

VI. Contained. The beginning of a period in which Assange is locked up; a period that will turn out to last 14 years.

VII. A Tent in an Embassy. In the building of the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, Assange and his girlfriend and later wife Stella experience romantic moments. When inside a tent, you can imagine that the tent is outside in the wild.

VIII. Solitude. The government of Ecuador prohibits Assange from receiving any more visitors. Even Stella and his children (conceived in the embassy) are no longer allowed to visit him.

IX. Arrest. A short while later, the Ecuadorian government denies Assange access to their embassy, whereupon he is arrested.

X. Isolation. In intensified form, his isolation is now continued in the “Hell Wing” of His Majesty’s Prison Belmarsh near London. Here he will spend five years in an isolation cell, 23 hours a day all alone.

XI. Finale: Breaking Free. Starting from the nothingness with which the previous part ended, there is a build-up to a big, positive climax, underscoring that the sacrifice Assange has made has not been in vain, and that justice will always prevail in the end.

As I delved into the life of Julian Assange, I also learned about views of people like Daniel Estulin, who in his book Deconstructing Wikileaks seeks to expose Assange as an intelligence asset tasked with sustaining the global status quo; and Christine Ann Sands, who additionally claims that everything we know about Assange is a lie. Even the person shown to the world as the released Assange would not be the real Assange. All this is certainly not inconceivable: indeed we are living in a world where reality is stranger than the most fanciful fiction.

From the various sources I have studied about Assange, a picture emerges of a man with strengths as well as weaknesses (as we all have), and a picture of someone who suffered injuries in his youth. I also wanted to pay attention to those injuries in my composition, for example in the second part, in which a shady cult called The Family asserts its dark influence. Be that as it may, I believe that even if people like Estulin and Sands are right – in whole or in part – Assange still has earned a musical Homage. If dark things are to be stopped, they must first come to light. And, one way or another, Assange has made an important contribution to the world in that regard.

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