Early life and career Hoedemaekers' interest in music was first sparked when he started making electronic compositions on a
Commodore Amiga 500 as a pre-teen and became part of the
demoscene. A few years later, he worked as an ambient and techno producer within the emerging Dutch electronic music scene. He subsequently enrolled in the
Royal Conservatory in The Hague, but left after one year and started working with rock bands instead, gaining experience in writing and producing. About's debut album
Bongo was released on
Jason Forrest's
Cock Rock Disco label in 2006. For live shows, Hoedemaekers was joined on stage by Marg van Eenbergen. In 2007, Hoedemaekers co-produced an album for an indie rock band Voicst alongside
Peter Katis (
Interpol,
The National) and joined the band as a keyboard player. In the same year, Rutger moved to Berlin to start a modular studio in
Kreuzberg together with two friends. This studio became a creative hub for composers like
Jóhann Jóhannsson,
Dustin O’Halloran and
Hildur Gudnadottir.
2011–2015: Bart Constant In Berlin, Rutger started his second solo project under the name
Bart Constant. His debut
Tell Yourself Whatever You Have To was released on
PIAS Recordings in 2011 to critical acclaim. His video for the single
Do Better, featuring
Dustin O'Halloran, won Best Music Video at the
Netherlands Film Festival that same year.
2015–present: Film and TV score work While still performing as Bart Constant, Hoedemaekers started working as a composer under his own name for film and TV. In 2015,
Jóhann Jóhannsson asked him to co-compose the score for Icelandic crime series
Trapped (
BBC Four,
France 2,
ZDF), together with
Hildur Gudnadottir. Their
original score for the series was awarded with an
Edda Award for Best Music in 2016. Hoedemaekers also worked with Jóhannsson on
Darren Aronofsky's
mother! and James Marsh's
The Mercy, for which he composed additional music. In 2018, Hoedemaekers scored his first feature as a solo composer for German production
The Last Berliner, which won Best Feature at the Manchester Film Festival. He subsequently created the original score for
Hulu and
ARTE production ''No Man's Land'', which premiered in 2020. In 2020, Hoedemaekers signed with
FatCat Records's imprint
130701. His debut record on the label,
The Age of Oddities, was released on March 5, 2021. In 2022, he contributed eight original pieces to Ed Perkins' HBO documentary
The Princess, alongside a score by
Martin Phipps. Hoedemaekers went on to create the original score for
Shangri-La, Paradise Under Construction, which premiered at 2022 edition of
IDFA. Hoedemaekers also created the score for
Angeline Jolie-directed feature
Without Blood, starring
Salma Hayek and
Demián Bichir, which premiered at the
Toronto International Film Festival in 2024. == Discography ==