Henk Hofstede, the legendary singer of the Dutch group The Nits, met Leonard Cohen at a television studio in Brussels in 1988. Henk, who had been a long-time fan, plucked up his courage and went over to talk to Cohen. They ate together at the station’s cafeteria, where Cohen talked to Henk about a world tour in the works and the fact that he didn’t have a group yet. He ended up asking Henk if The Nits would be interested in accompanying him!
Unfortunately, The Nits themselves were on tour following the huge success of their album, “In the Dutch Mountains”, and they couldn’t get their schedules to coincide. Years later, Henk still wakes up in the middle of the night dreaming of the world tour they never got to do!
Two years later, Henk organised a pilgrimage with his friend, Finnish director Seppo Pietikainen, to the island of Hydra, the Greek Island where Cohen wrote his first songs.

They documented their trip in a short film. When he returned to the island in 2003, Henk met Belgian writer Marc Hendrickx, who was writing a book on Cohen. For the Dutch edition of the book, Henk recorded Yesterday’s Tomorrow, an album featuring 9 Leonard Cohen songs and Night Owl, an original song that The Nits would incorporate into their repertoire.
It is how the AVALANCHE QUARTET was born. Since then, 2 more albums have been released. Avalanche Quartet plays regularly across Europe, including at the 2007 edition of Tombées de la Nuit. They revisit Cohen’s repertoire like an old house to come home to, from the cellar to the attic, from Bird on a wire to Famous Blue Raincoat, Who by Fire and Lover Lover, Lover, in a musical journey that is free, reverential and enthralling. It is a beautifully breathtaking odyssey into the repertoire of the recently departed Canadian.