Specially for The Voice, a theme at the festival, the New Rotterdam Jazz Orchestra – made up of key figures from the Dutch jazz scene – is performing a unique and one-time-only set with vocal artist Andreas Schaerer. This Swiss composer and virtuoso vocalist has mastered a wide range of singing techniques and is renowned for his ‘sprechgesang’ or recitative, an expressionistic style that balances somewhere between singing and speaking. Schaerer is a master in sound imitation, beat-boxing and scatting, and he possesses a phenomenal coloratura: the ornamentation, trills and tremolos so distinctive of the opera. Derek Otte, the official city poet, will also be in attendance. One of the best-known artists of the spoken word in the Netherlands, he has a knack of finding the right words to convey the down-to-earth mentality that is so typical of Rotterdam.