Legends of the Commodore 64 & Amiga scene

Handle: E.V.S

Real name: Edwin Van Santen

Country: Netherlands

Date of death: 24/05/2006

Edwin Van Santen aka “EVS” (initials of his full name)  was a member of the c64 music  group (label)  : 20CC (20th Century Composers) E.V.S   was very talented Sid musician , he did plenty sid tunes that were used for a lot of cool demos  , games and intros.

from “8BIT MAYHEM C64 SCENE PODCAST” Website:

It seemed today would be just another day at the office but then I opened the Commodore 64 Scene Database and noticed a new topic about Edwin van Santen.
First a rumour but later it was confirmed; Edwin van Santen aka EVS/20th Century Composers passed away on May 24th, 2006 due to lunge cancer at the age of 32.

The news was recieved almost a month later by the C64 Scene.
Edwin quitted the scene somewhere in 1994 and moved on as a hardcore techno producer and lost contact with the C64 scene.
I’m not that familiar with that side of techno but reading the responses on several forums he was a quite wellknown and successful producer.

Edwin is no more but his music lives on.
He meant a lot for the evolution of the demoscene and inspired dozens of people to start composing on the C64.
That’s why I dedicate this podcast to him and his music.

Download the Podcast

I hope you enjoy this one.
Maybe you discover that he made that tune that you always whistled on the way to school back in the days…

Edwin, rest in peace!

Falco paul(his mate to 20CC group ) a condolences letter (very touchy words  )

Hi *

Don’t know if many of you remember me, but Edwin an I founded 20cc way back in the midst of the 90’s.

Edwin did the music, and I mostly concetrated on the technical bits and pieces (ie: the “music player” software).

Like so many others, I just heard this bad news yesterday. I knew Edwin quite well, as we teamed together to spread the 20CC sound.

Offcourse the sad news came as quite a shock to me, as Edwin was a good friend (we had almost daily contact). He would often call by phone just to let me hear a new tune he had been working on during the day (no email in these early days)!

I can also vividly remember the many times that we were just sitting together with a little “minikey” keyboard (2 octave kid thingie, we didn’t had a lot of cash to buy any pro tools). Even though we had no proper gear to work with, you could still really hear the talent that he had. Most of the musical knowledge he had was self tought. Just imagine what would have been possible would he have had full “formal” musical training!

Anyway, I still like to listen to his work nowadays (and not only because of sentimental reasons). Offcourse, some tunes are stronger than others, but there is some very powerfull material out there. I guess we may now consider this work his “heritage” to the scene. Too bad there aren’t many conversions of his work on remix.kwed.org (much of his work is definitly worth remixing).

Although I lost contact with Edwin after “growing up”, it’s hard to forget him. He was a very extravert personality with a cheeky sense of humour – there was always a good laugh when you were hanging out with Edwin.

Too bad he had to leave us at this young age. My thoughts are with his famility and all his many (old and new) friends.

Falco

Various c64 tunes by EVS:

Very cool Mp3 compilation made from him sid tunes . the compilation made by

8BIT MAYHEM C64 SCENE PODCAST website

http://8bitmayhem.untergrund.net/2006/06/episode-7-tribute-to-edwin-van-santen.html

Our contribution to Edwin Van Santen featuring the 8bit Mayhem podcast music

Edwin van Santen (EVS) was a Dutch SID composer, of 20CC fame, who was interviewed at Dutch national radio in 1990, at the Firato, a gadget and computer fair. See below for a link to the full transcript (in English). Sadly, EVS died ten years ago in May 2006 at age 32.

c64 profile:

http://csdb.dk/scener/?id=1684

Remembrance page written by his friend of 20CC label Falco paul 

http://20thcenturycomposers.blogspot.co.il/

Sid collection contain E.V.S. sids music:

http://www.hvsc.c64.org/

EVS Discography listed on Discogs:

http://www.discogs.com/artist/15462-DJ-Perpetrator

rest in peace Edwin…