Jeroen van Veen (pianist)

Short biography

Jeroen Van Veen studied at the Utrechts Conservatorium (HKU) with Alwin Bär and Håkon Austbø. Since 1988 he has played concerts and recitals throughout Europe and North America and has recorded over 50 CDs for Mirasound, Koch, Naxos, Brilliant Classics and his own label PIANO. Van Veen's compositions are mostly solo piano works and could be described as mostly minimal music. His latest recordings have also focused on minimal music, including a 9 CD Minimal Piano Collection box set, somewhat dominated by music of Philip Glass, the complete piano music of George Crumb and a collaboration on recording all Steve Reich's Chamber music.

Among other functions, Van Veen is the director of Van Veen Productions [1], Piano Mania [2], and the Simeon ten Holt Foundation [3]. He is also artistic director of the Murray Dranoff Two Piano Competition [4], based in Miami, where he and his brother Maarten van Veen were prize winners in 1995. In 2016 Van Veen received the NPO Radio 4 award; Van Veen was praised for his 'out of the box' programming and finding new ways to attract a new audience for classical music.

Extended biography

Jeroen Van Veen started playing the piano at the age of 7. He studied at the Utrechts Conservatorium with Alwin Bär and Håkon Austbö. In 1993 he passed the Performing Artists' Exam. Van Veen has played with orchestras conducted by Howard Williams (Adams), Péter Eötvös (Zimmermann) in Amsterdam, Utrecht, Vienna and Budapest and in the United States with Neal Stulberg (Mozart & Bartók) and Robert Craft (Stravinsky) He has played recitals in Austria, Belgium, Canada, England, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Russia & the USA.

Van Veen attended master classes with Claude Helffer, Hans-Peter & Volker Stenzl and Roberto Szidon. He was invited to several festivals, a.o. the Reder Piano Festival (1988), Festival der Kunsten in Bad Gleichenberg (1992), Wien Modern (1993), Holland Dance Festival (1998) Lek Art Festival (1996–2007). Van Veen recorded for major Dutch Radio- and Television companies like AVRO, NOS, IKON, NCRV, TROS/Internet, WTBC-TV & Radio (Florida, U.S.A.) and Moscow Television. In 1992, Van Veen recorded his first CD with his brother Maarten as the internationally recognized Piano duo Van Veen. In 1995 Piano duo Van Veen made their debut in the United States. They were prizewinners in the prestigious 4th International Murray Dranoff Two Piano Competition in Miami, Florida. After this achievement they toured the United States and Canada many times. The documentary Two Pianos One Passion (nominated for an Emmy Award in 1996) documents them as a duo.

Besides performing, Jeroen is co-founder and artistic director of the International Student Piano Competition, which is held in Utrecht every two years. In 1995 Jeroen Van Veen founded Van Veen & Van Veen (Van Veen & Co.), a piano duo with Sandra Van Veen. As such, they mainly perform music for multiple pianos by the Dutch composer Simeon ten Holt. Furthermore, in 1999 Van Veen initiated a concert series Pianova in the Concertgebouw, Amsterdam. Beside his career as a solo pianist Van Veen also participates in the following ensembles: Kunstgroep vier man op de stoep, Piano Ensemble, The International Piano Quartet, The Simeon Quartet, Piano Mania, DJ Piano and Jeroen van Veen & Friends.

The various compositions by Van Veen could be described as Minimal Music with different faces, crossovers to jazz, blues, soundscape, Avant-garde, techno, trance and pop music. Currently Van Veen is director of Van Veen Productions, Chairman of the Simeon ten Holt Foundation, Culemborg Cultural Foundation, Pianomania Foundation and artistic director of several music festivals in Culemborg, Utrecht and Veldhoven. He is active in the International Utrecht Student Piano Competition and the Murray Dranoff Two Piano Competition. Over the last 15 years Van Veen recorded more than 110 CDs for several labels (Mirasound, Koch, Naxos, Brilliant Classics) and his own label PIANO. The latest box is an eleven CD box set with his project called the Minimal Piano Collection volume X-XX as an extension for his successful Minimal Piano Collection Volume I-IX.

The recording of Les Noces for Koch and Naxos was stated in The New York Times as "The orchestral colors and balances throughout (...) are more nuanced and varied than in any previous recording". The recording of the Piano four hands of Erik Satie was rated on Classics Today with 10 out of 10 for artistic quality and 10 out of 10 for sound quality and said it to be "...a must for Satie fans."

List of works

Other official functions