Pierre Volders

Pierre Volders was born on May 2nd 1972 in Breda, The Netherlands. At the age of six he became a member of the local musical society St. Joris in Dorst. He began his musical studies on the euphonium with Michael Woldinga, six years later Pierre commenced trombone lessons from Michael.

In 1990, he went to the Rotterdam School of Music to study trombone with George Wiegel. He followed masterclasses of Michel Bequet, Victor Sumerkin, Bart van Lier and Philip Jones. Pierre is a founding member of the Rotterdam Trombone Quartet that reached the final of the prestigious Concert Artists Guild in New York. During this time with the quartet he also recorded his first CD called “Dioscuri”.

During his studies Pierre was appointed principal trombonist of the Nederlands Ballet Orkest (Dutch Ballet Orchestra), two years later he was appointed principal trombonist with the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra. He is also a member of the New Trombone Collective and The Rotterdam Philharmonic Brass Ensemble aswell he is one of the four official “City musicians of Rotterdam” and a member of the World Orchestra of Peace.

In 1998 Pierre graduated cum-laude from the Rotterdam Conservatory and in that same year was employed as a professor at the conservatory, together with George Wiegel and Jörgen van Rijen he leads the trombone department.

Pierre studied Wind Band Conducting with Jaap Koops, Arie van Beek and Jos van de Sijde. In 1999 he graduated and received the Grand Diploma for conducting Wind Bands with the Band of the Royal Marines.

Jörgen van Rijen

Jörgen van Rijen studied with George Wiegel at the Rotterdam Conservatory, where he finished his solo degree with the highest possible mark, 10 summa cum laude. He continued his studies with Michel Becquet at the Conservatoire National SupÈrieur de Musique de Lyon, where he also studied baroque trombone with Daniel Lasalle.
 
Since 1997 Jörgen has been principal trombonist with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam, of which he was the youngest member for several years. Previously he held the same position with the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra. He teaches trombone at the Rotterdam Conservatory and is guestteacher at the Musikhochschule Luzern .

In 2004 he was awarded the prestigious Netherlands Music Prize, the highest distinction in the field of music from the Dutch Ministry of Culture. In 2006 Jörgen received the Borletti-Buitoni Trust Award. This prestigous international award is yearly presented by the Borletti-Buitoni Trust to a selection of the most promising and talented young soloists and ensembles. Jörgen also won other prizes, including first prizes at two international trombone competitions, in Toulon (France) in 2001 and in Guebwiller (France) 1999.

Besides this Jörgen is an active chamber musician in ensembles like the Ebony Band, the New Trombone Collective and the Brass of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra (RCO brass).

Alexander Verbeek

Alexander Verbeek, born on April 6th 1973, began his musical education at the age of 11 at the Music School North East Twente in Oldenzaal with Hans Schippers.

In 1991 he began his studies at the Conservatory of Enschede with Hans Schippers as his instructor. In 1993 he transferred to the Rotterdam Conservatory to study with George Wiegel where he completed his bachelor’s degree in 1998. On May 25th 2000 he completed his master’s degree.

Alexander has followed masterclasses with Michel Becquet, Bart van Lier, Christian Lindberg and Victor Sumerkin. From 1994 to 1996 he played in the National Youth Orchestra.

In 1998 he became principal trombonist with the Dutch Ballet Orchestra and in 2000 he became principal trombonist with the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra.

Bart Claessens

Bart Claessens, born September 7, 1982 in Dordrecht, had his first trombone lessons from Ruud Welle when he was 11 years old.

From the time he was 14 he studied at the Rotterdam Conservatory with George Wiegel, Jörgen van Rijen en Pierre Volders.
He also had lessons with Ben van Dijk and Bart van Lier.

In 2001, Bart joined the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra at the age of 19.
He also plays in various ensembles including the Ebony Band, Brass of the RCO and the New Trombone Collective.
From August 2007 he is appointed as principal trombonist of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra.

Remko de Jager

Remko de Jager (1971) started cornet and euphonium lessons with Tseard Verbeek at the age of 9 and 2 years later switched to trombone with Rene Kuitert and Jilt Jansma.

In 1990 he started his studies at the Conservatory of Rotterdam with George Wiegel and completed his master’s degree cum laude in 1998.
He followed master classes with Michel Becquet, Bart van Lier and Victor Sumerkin.
In 1992 he won 1st prize at a competition of Young Music Talent of the Netherlands and in 1994 a 3rd prize at an international trombone competition in Nizhny Novgorod, Russia.

As a member of the Rotterdam Trombone Quartet he reached the finals at the prestigious Concert Artists Guild competition in New York and recorded the CD “Dioscuri” which was recorded especially for this event.

Since 1997 Remko has been a trombonist with the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra where he performed as a soloist in the double concerto for horn and alto trombone from Michael Haydn.

Remko plays in various ensembles including Doelen Ensemble, Rotterdam Philharmonic Trombone Quartet and the New Trombone Collective. He also performs as a soloist.

Since September 2000 he has held a teaching position at the Conservatory of Rotterdam.

Nico Schippers

In 1992, after completing a diploma in computer studies, he began his studies at the Conservatory of Enschede with Peter van Klink. In 1996 he transferred to the Rotterdam Conservatory where he studied with George Wiegel.

Nico also studied at the Conservatoire National Superieur de Musique te Lyon in 1999 with Michel Becquet and his assistant Alain Manfrin. In 1999 he completed his bachelor's degree. From 1999 to 2001 he studied for the master's degree at the Rotterdam Conservatory.

He has followed master-classes with Viktor Sumerkin, Christian Lindberg, Bart van Lier and Denis Wick. Since 1998 Nico has played euphonium and principal trombone with the Gustav Mahler Youth Orchestra conducted by Claudio Abbado.

Working freelance Nico plays with the Netherland Philharmonic Orchestra, Residentie Orchestra, Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, Mahler Chamber Orchestra and the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra.

From December 2000 Nico worked with the Dutch Ballet Orchestra in Amsterdam as principal trombonist. Also he plays in the Brass of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra and the New Trombone Collective. With this group he performed with Christian Lindberg and at the International Trombone Festival in Helsinki, Finland (2003) and New Orleans, USA (2005).

Since (the year) 2004 Nico has been trombonist with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra Amsterdam. Since 2007 he teaches classical trombone at the Fontys Conservatory Tilburg.

Martin Schippers

Martin Schippers was born on September 22nd 1982 in Enschede. At the age of 7 he started playing euphonium in the windband ‘Wilhelmina’ in his hometown Glanerbrug and was supported and taught greatly by his grandfather. At the age of 15 he switched to trombone and got lessons from his uncle Hans Schippers.

Two years later Martin started his studies in the prepatory year at the Rotterdam Conservatory en studied Higher Informatics at the Hogeschool Enschede. After this year he made the choice to go on with the trombonestudies and he went to study with George Wiegel, Jorgen van Rijen and Pierre Volders.

In his 2nd year of study he was appointed as 2nd trombonist in the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra. Since 2005 Martin is solotrombonist of the Radio Chamber Philharmonic.

Martin had lessons with Michel Becquet, Joseph Alessi, Victor Sumerkin, Patrick Sheridan, Bart van Lier and Ben van Dijk. As member of the tromboneclass Rotterdam and the New Trombone Collective he gave concerts at festivals in cities such as Helsinki, New Orleans and Birmingham.

Koen Kaptijn

Koen Kaptijn (1976-) completed his master’s degree in December 2001 at the Conservatory of Rotterdam in 1994 under George Wiegel, Jörgen van Rijen, Pierre Volders, Jilt Jansma and Bart van Lier and. In 2000 he was awarded a scholarship to study for 3 months at the Conservatoire National Superieure de Musique in Lyon under Michel Becquet.

He has followed master classes with Christian Lindberg, Viktor Sumerkin, Maxim Ignatiev and Jonas Bylund. In 1998 he won the Erasmus Chamber Music prize as a member of a brass quintet.
He also studied composition for 2 years as a secondary major under Peter-Jan Wagemans, René Uijlenhoed and Klaas de Vries.

Koen is highly involved in contemporary music. He is principal trombonist in Orchestra de Volharding and trombonist in Ensemble-MAE in Amsterdam. He also works as a freelance trombonist at regularly basis with other ensembles such as Schönberg Ensemble, Asko Ensemble and the Nieuw Ensemble. In 2006 he was involved as a soloist in the highly acclaimed music theatre group Orkater with the Dutch star actress Ariane Schluter.

Mark Boonstra

In the period from 1993 to 1998 Mark Boonstra studied with George Wiegel and in 1998 he completed his bachelor’s degree. He continued to study with Ben van Dijk and in June 2000 received his final degree. In 2002 he completed the master’s degree at the Conservatory of Rotterdam on the contrabass- and basstrombone.

He joined several masterclasses with Michel Bequet, Christian Lindberg, Bart van Lier, Viktor Sumerkin, Patrick Sheridan. He took part in ensemble and orchestra projects of several Conservatories, the National Youth Orchestra and the Dutch Student Orchestra. He also participated in the Schleswig-Holstein Festival Orchestra in the summer of 1999.
He substituted in the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, the Gelders Orchestra, the Radio Philharmonic Orchestra and Holland Symfonia.

In March 2002 Mark became bass trombonist with The Brabants Orchestra.