Our Jordaan is not a sweet jukebox show, but a big, narrative musical about decades of changes in the Jordaan. Writer and director Diederik Ebbinge does not opt for individual sing-alongs, but for one life that holds everything together: that of Greet.
Greet is about eighty and living in a nursing home around the year 2000. From that chair, she looks back on her life as a single mother after World War II. You follow her through the poverty and frayed edges of the neighborhood in the 1950s and 1960s, the hassles with agencies, as well as the mutual aid in the streets and cafes.
An important anchor in her story is the neighborhood choir De Belcanto's, founded by her husband Jopie. That choir runs like a thread through the performance. Through the songs and rehearsals, you see how such a choir became a second family for an entire neighborhood, and how that slowly changes as the neighborhood tilts.
An important anchor in her story is the neighborhood choir The Bel cantos, founded by her husband Jopie.
Around the series in the RAI Theater, Our Jordaan is touring other cities and the musical is also playing in theaters such as DeLaMar and venues in Dronten, Haarlem, Enschede and Almere, among others. But it is precisely in the RAI Theater, with its complete metamorphosis into Café Koster and the large scale of the production, that the idea of a Jordanian pub in a modern convention venue comes together to the maximum.