Jan Willem de Vriend is Principal Conductor of the Wiener KammerOrchester, Principal Guest

Conductor of the City of Kyoto Symphony Orchestra, and artistic partner of the Bergen

Philharmonic Orchestra. He makes regular guest appearances with such ensembles as the

Belgian National Orchestra, HR-Sinfonieorchester Frankfurt, Melbourne Symphony, NDR

Radiophilharmonie Hannover, Netherlands Radio Philharmonic, Orchestre National de Lyon,

Orquestra Simfònica de Barcelona i Nacional de Catalunya, Rotterdam Philharmonic, Royal

Concertgebouw Orchestra, Tonhalle Orchester Zürich, Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra and

Yomiuri Nippon Symphony.

In the 2025/26 season Jan Willem de Vriend returns to the Musikkollegium Winterthur,

Netherlands Radio Philharmonic, Stavanger Symphony, Stuttgart Philharmonic, Rotterdam

Philharmonic, Trondheim Symphony and Tonhalle-Orchester Zurich. He will also appear in a

semi-staged opera productionof Lo Speziale (Director: Eva Buchmann) at the Ludwigsburger

Schloßfestspiele.

Furthermore three new recordings were recently released: Mozart Piano Concertos Nos 20 & 12

(Dejan Lazić/ Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra - Challenge Records), Schumann Symphonies Nos

3 & 4 (Stavanger Symphony Orchestra - Challenge Records) and Emilie Mayer Symphonies Nos

4 & 6 (NDR Radiophilharmonie - CPO).

Jan Willem de Vriend was Principal Conductor of the Residentie Orkest Den Haag and Chief

Conductor of Phion, Orkest van Gelderland & Overijssel. He was also Principal Guest Conductor

of the Orchestre National de Lille, Orquestra Simfònica de Barcelona i Nacional de Catalunya,

South Netherlands Philharmonic and the Stuttgart Philharmonic Orchestra.

De Vriend and the Netherland Symphony Orchestra went on to record a substantial Beethoven

catalogue for Challenge Classics, embracing the complete symphonies and concertos (with

Hannes Minnaar and Liza Ferschtman among the soloists). Classic FM praised the interpretation

of Symphony No 7 for “a bounding flair that does real justice to the composer's capacity for joy”.

Further landmarks in the Challenge Classics catalogue are the complete Mendelssohn

symphonies, again with the Netherlands Symphony Orchestra, and the complete symphonies of

Schubert, recorded with the Residentie Orkest, also de Vriend’s orchestra for a Decca recording

of Mendelssohn’s complete works for piano and orchestra.

De Vriend first established an international reputation as Artistic Director of the Combattimento

Consort Amsterdam, which he established in 1982 and led from the violin until 2015. Specialising

in music of the 17th and 18th century, and applying historically informed practice on modern

instruments, the consort gave new life to many rarely heard works and Gramophone magazine

praised its players as “with technical finesse and a lively feeling for characterisation”. Its

collaborative spirit lives on in de Vriend’s approach as he explores and energises the symphonic

repertoire, in particular the music of Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Mendelssohn, Schumann,

Brahms and Johann Strauss.

In the field of opera, in both Europe and the USA, de Vriend and Combattimento Consort

Amsterdam gave performances of works by Monteverdi, Haydn, Handel, Telemann, and J.S.

Bach (the Hunting and Coffee cantatas at the Leipzig Bach Festival), all in stagings by the director

Eva Buchmann. Operas by such composers as Mozart, Verdi and Cherubini featured in his

seasons with the Netherlands Symphony Orchestra, which included a visit to Switzerland with

productions of Don Giovanni and Rossini’s La Gazzetta, again directed by Eva Buchmann. De

Vriend has also conducted operas in Amsterdam (Nederlandse Reisopera), Barcelona,

Strasbourg, Luzern, Schwetzingen and Bergen.

In the Netherlands he has presented several television series and is well known for his

appearances on a variety of other programmes about music. In 2012 he received a prize from

the national station NPO Radio 4 for his creative contribution to classical music.