The Netherlands Chamber Choir exists since 1937, and has been one of the world’s top choirs for decades. The Netherlands Chamber Choir has been internationally praised by critics for its homogeneous sound and for the soloist quality of the singers. One of the choir’s missions is to keep choral music very much alive as an art form, by looking for new formats, by innovative commissions and exciting collaborations. It results in concerts that are not only perceived as beautiful, but that appeal to all senses.
Education and participation are a vital part of the choir’s mission. The Netherlands Chamber Choir provides coaching, workshops, and ‘adopts’ choirs as supporting act for their own concerts.
Besides their own concert series, the choir often collaborates with renowned ensembles such as the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, ASKO|Schönberg, La Fenice and Concert Lorrain.
From August 1, 2015 Peter Dijkstra watches over the unique sound of the Netherlands Chamber Choir The Netherlands Chamber Choir had Felix de Nobel as its first chief conductor. Uwe Gronostay, Tõnu Kaljuste, Stephen Layton and Risto Joost were his respective successors. Each of them gave the Netherlands Chamber Choir, and choral music in general, new, major impulses.
Andrea Gabrieli is being considered as one of the most seminal Venetian composers of the Renaissance age. Yet, details about his life are scarce. In previous studies his year of birth was estimated to be around 1510 and he was thought to be a student of Adrian Willaert, who was the kapellmeister of St Mark's Basilica at the time. In the 1980s, however, registers were discovered showing not only his date of death (August 30, 1585) but also showed he was "about 52 years old", making his year of birth 1533.
One thing that is certain is that between 1562 and 1565 he stayed in Germany, in Munich, to work with Orlando Di Lasso. In 1566 he became the main organist of St Mark's Basilica in Venice.