Cor Veerman

Producer and musician (e.g. bass, keyboards, accordion) from Volendam, the Netherlands, nickname Dekker. Also in the database as Cor Dekker. Born 17 Sept 1947. Died 13 Febr. 2024.

Cor was born into a musical family, his father Thoom Veerman (1910-1974) was a singer and trumpet player in the EVO Band and also played clarinet, saxophone and accordion. He thaught his son Cor and the other 12 children also how to play. Cor learned to play music at an early age and joined the fanfare at the age of twelve, alongside, for example Cees Tol, who later played in BZN. One of Cor's brothers is Jack Veerman, drummer in BZN.

The first band Cor played in was the Beatboys, who shortly after that changed their name to Left Side, he played on their first 1968 single Confusion In My Mind. He then left for Alles with the single Murdock 9-6182 / Deus Bonus Est in 1969. After this he was bass player in the George Baker Selection for three years and went on tours with that band in the Netherlands and other countries, including France, Germany and Turkey.

In the early 70's he released 3 solo singles under the alias Alan Decker, besides Holland also released in Belgium and the UK. His single Barbara was the only single entering the Dutch Tipparade for 3 weeks with highest peak Tip 17 in 1972.

Around 1979-'80, together with his brother Klaas Dekker, he took the initiative for the founding of De Dekker Band, in which two more brothers and a few other artists such as Theo van Scherpenseel played along. They were active with this band for about seven years. They have only released one single Volendammer Volkslied / Lilly, of which both songs ended up in the top 25 of the Volendammer Top 1000 in 2013.

He also was the owner of the Motje café in Volendam for 25 years and also a songwriter. The songs of Alan Decker and De Dekker Band were composed by Cor. He also wrote for others, such as the 1983 adaptation of Rosie (originally by Dick Wagner) for the album Third Life by The Cats, together with Piet Veerman.

In 1997 he was one of the initiators of the first Volendammer Kermis Hit Festival 1997 CD. This was the kick-off for the series of Volendammer Kermis Hit Festival CD's, during the yearly event of the Volendammer fair. A few years later, in 1999 he started with releasing a couple of alternative 'kermis-CD's' starting with Kermis 1999. Cor also had a music studio behind his home C.I.M. Studio Volendam, where he also recorded music for other artists, such as the 2000 CD [r11540116].

In 2013 he released a CD with self-written songs, which - he says - is one of the only CD's released in the Volendam dialect. His daughter Barbara, who had not previously been active as a singer before, sang along on the CD.