When Willemien Rust’s father Christof Heyns suddenly died a few years back, the closely-knit family was devastated, but being who they are, they turned their grief into something that paid homage and in this young performer’s life, it was music. She tells DIANE DE BEER about honouring her dad:

Knowing the Heyns family for quite a few decades, not much surprises me when it comes to the way they conduct their lives. With human rights activist Christof Heyns, a professor of Human Rights Law And the Director of the Institute for International and Comparative Law in Africa at the University of Pretoria, as your father and a mother who when I first met her sang professionally whenever she could, in-between raising a family and introducing the children to the creative world as part of their lives. It’s therefor no surprise that when it came to honouring her beloved father, Willemien turned to music, something she has been passionate about all her life.

Taking on French as a third language, that also played a part in her varied career, but when she wanted to express affairs of the heart, music was always the favoured carrier.

She knew she wanted to find a way to process the loss, unexpected, devastating and way too soon. It took five years, but because she’s still young, time was on her side because that was never the issue. “This was big for me,” she explains the eve before the album was launched.

“It started with the songs,” she says, as she captured her feelings with little thought for the end result. For her it was a search for meaning, making sense of the madness which engulfed her and finally became a never-ending circle which pointed her to the place to deal with her grief.

In the beginning, writing and performing the music was therapy but as time went on, she realized that she could turn this into a tribute to someone she loved and missed.

As someone who has been making music most of her life, at home and on stage, once she needed guidance and support, she had friends to turn to. Chanie Jonker (below left with Willemien right) became her guide  in what she eventually hoped to achieve.

She describes her group of artistic friends and acquaintances she pulled together affectionately as “mad dogs”, all of whom stood in as soundboards at different stages of the project which was still just a dream.

“I’ve always loved collaborating,” she says about putting together as well as launching an album which has become much more than simply music. She turned to someone who she knew about rather than a friend, producer Giden Botes (Watershed). It was soon clear that he was going to challenge her musically. “He described my music as old-fahioned,” she said laughingly, and she knew that she had found an accomplice. “He helped me to discover my voice,” she says.

To begin with, each song is in a different genre reflecting both her and her father’s love and passion for music. And then all the connections that helped to fulfill her dream. What she found in the process was her confidence and nerve to go ahead.

And then the launch. Popping in for a chat the day before, she explained that she wanted this to be an immersive experience. With her mother someone who always encouraged her family to opt for the creative route, her brother, Adam, a television- and filmmaker, put together a video that played on a loop at the launch which was held in their own personal performance space just above the garage at her childhood home.

She wanted people to experience the music in a tangible fashion and to choose how they wanted to listen, on their own in a dark room, or together with the African night as the backdrop. Each person’s listening experience would be uniquely linked to the space, the way the song spoke to them and the excitement of the event.

What she discovered and held on to were memories not only of the music but also of a positive embracing energy which has always been the family’s trademark.

While gathering all her friends and family who could collaborate on the night, Willemien found a way to release her music in a world that was ready for more than the traditional album presentation. She wanted to celebrate what was for her a collaborative experience, and she wanted her music to land and shine in a particular way.

This turned out to be a theatrical night of fun which gave everyone a chance to experience Willemien and her music in the way she wanted them to and the guest of honour, although physically absent was and remains her father.