Walter Verdin

Video-artist who also made an interesting excursion into popular music in the early eighties.

He was born in Anderlecht in May 1953 and studied Art History at the University of Leuven. When he started to make posters for music & theater gigs & record sleeves he got into contact with the scene of Belgian musicians.

In 1979 he formed the short-lived project "Specimen en The Rizikoos", together with Jean-Marie Aerts and Stoy Stoffelen (both members of the band that backed up Big Bill, Raymond van het Groenewoud , Split, ...) and Karel Vereertbrugghen (Stewball, Kris de Bruyne, later on best known for his writing of jokes & television-formats). As Specimen & The Rizikoos they recorded "Storingen" (Interferences) in 1979, together with actors/actresses such as Josse De Pauw and Hilde Wils.

In the meantime, he also had a music-theater "grasgroen" (green as grass) in which also his sister Mieke Verdin (nowadays an actress for the company "dito'dito") and Carla Vanparys figured as "de citronella's". That same Carla Vanparys was also the singer in 1981 of the song "Dark in the Shadow" by "De Kreet", which was actually the second single of Specimen (as Carla & The Specimen or "De Kreet" to be found on "Big in Belgium" and a Parsley compilation).

He accomplished the breakthrough to a bigger audience with his solo-work. The single "Er is iets" (There is something) became quite a popular single in 1980 : it got a prize as a "Best Debut" at Zomerhit 1980 (befóre Lio), got to n° in the Flemish top 10 and to n° 30 in the Belgian Top 30. The single was followed by the well-received album "Cinema", filled with fresh dutch-language pop, reggae & disco.

A few years later, Walter Verdin would become a public figure even more, by his participation in Pas De Deux, the group (together with Hilde Van Roy and Dett Peyskens) that was sent off to the Eurovision Song Contest in 1983 with "Rendez-vous".

From 1985 he said good-bye to the pop-experiments and started committing himself completely to video-art. His best known project in this became "Videorhythmics".
He worked freelance for the University of Leuven and a number of other companies and filmed art-programs for the BRT. He also made dozens of independent theater and dance-video's. For a number of years he also was one of the "cultural ambassadors of Flanders".

Buy CD's of this band at

Albums :
- Cinema (Polydor, 1980)
Singles :
- Er is iets / Zin om in de muur te kruipen (Polydor, 1980)
- Chocolat dansant / 't is wel fijn (Polydor, 1980)

Specimen (De Kreet, Specimen & The Rizikoos)
- Storingen (samen met Rick Tubbax & The Taxi's "Bojangle Plays Tonight" op single uitgebracht) (Disk-O-Grino, 1979)
- Dark in the Shadow / De zus van Adeline (Parsley, 1981)