Jos van Immerseel (9 November 1945,
Antwerp||-||-||-||}Antwerp is a city and municipality in Belgium and the capital of the Antwerp province in Flanders, one of Belgium's three regions. Antwerp's total population is 472,071 and its total area is , giving a population density of 2,308 inhabitants per km²...
) is a
FlemishFlanders is the community of the Flemings but also one of the institutions in Belgium, and a geographical region located in parts of present-day Belgium, France, and the Netherlands...
harpsichordistA harpsichordist is a person who plays the harpsichord.Many baroque composers played the harpsichord, including Johann Sebastian Bach, Domenico Scarlatti, George Frideric Handel, François Couperin and Jean-Philippe Rameau...
.
Van Immerseel studied
organThe organ is a keyboard instrument of one or more divisions, each played with its own keyboard operated either with the hands or with the feet...
,
pianoThe piano is a musical instrument which is played by means of a keyboard. Widely used in Western music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music, and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...
and
harpsichordA harpsichord is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It produces sound by plucking a string when a key is pressed.In the narrow sense, "harpsichord" designates only the large wing-shaped instruments in which the strings are perpendicular to the keyboard...
at the Antwerp Conservatory under
Flor PeetersFlor Peeters was a Belgian composer, organist and teacher.Born and raised in the village of Tielen , he was the youngest child in a family of eleven. When sixteen years old, he began his studies at the Lemmens Institute in Mechelen, which was named after the nineteenth-century organist...
, Eugène Traey and
harpsichordistA harpsichordist is a person who plays the harpsichord.Many baroque composers played the harpsichord, including Johann Sebastian Bach, Domenico Scarlatti, George Frideric Handel, François Couperin and Jean-Philippe Rameau...
and musicologist
Kenneth GilbertKenneth Gilbert is an internationally renowned and widely recorded Canadian harpsichordist. He studied harpsichord in Paris with Ruggero Gerlin, one of the principal students of Wanda Landowska....
. He created the
Collegium MusicumThe Collegium Musicum was one of several types of musical societies that arose in German and German-Swiss cities and towns during the Reformation and thrived into the mid-18th century...
there, developing his interest in
RenaissanceThe Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Florence in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe...
and
BaroqueBaroque is an artistic style prevalent from the late 16th century to the early 18th century. The popularity and success of the Baroque style was encouraged by the Roman Catholic Church, which had decided at the time of the Council of Trent that the arts should communicate religious themes in...
music, later expanding his activities to include the Classical and early Romantic eras. He is now in demand as a fortepianist in concert halls across Europe, where he is known for his refined sensitivity to the rhetorical aspects of music and for his skills in improvisation.
Jos van Immerseel (9 November 1945,
Antwerp||-||-||-||}Antwerp is a city and municipality in Belgium and the capital of the Antwerp province in Flanders, one of Belgium's three regions. Antwerp's total population is 472,071 and its total area is , giving a population density of 2,308 inhabitants per km²...
) is a
FlemishFlanders is the community of the Flemings but also one of the institutions in Belgium, and a geographical region located in parts of present-day Belgium, France, and the Netherlands...
harpsichordistA harpsichordist is a person who plays the harpsichord.Many baroque composers played the harpsichord, including Johann Sebastian Bach, Domenico Scarlatti, George Frideric Handel, François Couperin and Jean-Philippe Rameau...
.
Van Immerseel studied
organThe organ is a keyboard instrument of one or more divisions, each played with its own keyboard operated either with the hands or with the feet...
,
pianoThe piano is a musical instrument which is played by means of a keyboard. Widely used in Western music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music, and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...
and
harpsichordA harpsichord is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It produces sound by plucking a string when a key is pressed.In the narrow sense, "harpsichord" designates only the large wing-shaped instruments in which the strings are perpendicular to the keyboard...
at the Antwerp Conservatory under
Flor PeetersFlor Peeters was a Belgian composer, organist and teacher.Born and raised in the village of Tielen , he was the youngest child in a family of eleven. When sixteen years old, he began his studies at the Lemmens Institute in Mechelen, which was named after the nineteenth-century organist...
, Eugène Traey and
harpsichordistA harpsichordist is a person who plays the harpsichord.Many baroque composers played the harpsichord, including Johann Sebastian Bach, Domenico Scarlatti, George Frideric Handel, François Couperin and Jean-Philippe Rameau...
and musicologist
Kenneth GilbertKenneth Gilbert is an internationally renowned and widely recorded Canadian harpsichordist. He studied harpsichord in Paris with Ruggero Gerlin, one of the principal students of Wanda Landowska....
. He created the
Collegium MusicumThe Collegium Musicum was one of several types of musical societies that arose in German and German-Swiss cities and towns during the Reformation and thrived into the mid-18th century...
there, developing his interest in
RenaissanceThe Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Florence in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe...
and
BaroqueBaroque is an artistic style prevalent from the late 16th century to the early 18th century. The popularity and success of the Baroque style was encouraged by the Roman Catholic Church, which had decided at the time of the Council of Trent that the arts should communicate religious themes in...
music, later expanding his activities to include the Classical and early Romantic eras. He is now in demand as a fortepianist in concert halls across Europe, where he is known for his refined sensitivity to the rhetorical aspects of music and for his skills in improvisation. (His cadenzas were singled out in reviews of his Beethoven concerto recordings.) He performs on his own instruments, travelling with his
fortepianoFortepiano designates the early version of the piano, from its invention by the Italian instrument maker Bartolomeo Cristofori around 1700 up to the early 19th century.-Construction:...
when necessary.
In 1987 van Immerseel established the period instrument ensemble Anima Eterna, which he continues to lead. During 1999 they toured
EuropeEurope is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally divided from Asia to its east by the water divide of the Ural Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian Sea, the Caucasus Mountains , and the Black Sea to the southeast...
with performances of Beethoven Symphonies.
In addition to his concertising, van Immerseel is professor at the Anvers Conservatory, where he uses historical instruments from the nearby Vleeshuis Museum to give masterclasses. He has also taught at the Sweelinck Conservatorium in
AmsterdamAmsterdam is the capital and largest city of the Netherlands, located in the province of North Holland in the west of the country...
and the Conservatoire National Supérieur in
ParisParis is the capital of France and the country's most populous city. It is situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, as well as given masterclasses at festivals in La Roque d’Anthéron, Utrecht,
SopronSopron ; , , Latin: Scarbantia) is a city in Hungary on the Austrian border, near the Neusiedler/Lake Fertő.- Ancient times-13th century :...
and
AnconaAncona is a city and a seaport in the Marche, a region of central Italy, population 101,909 . Ancona is situated on the Adriatic Sea and is the center of the province of Ancona and the capital of the region....
.
Van Immerseel appears on the VIVARTE label as a solo performer, as a soloist with Tafelmusik and as a participant in chamber music.
Since winning first prize at the inaugural Paris International Harpsichord Competition in 1973, Jos van Immerseel has gone on to establish a rare international career as a fortepianist and conductor specializing in music of the Baroque and Classical eras. A versatile musician who is accomplished on the organ and piano as well as harpsichord and fortepiano, van Immerseel has in particular gained a reputation for his performances of Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert on Sony Classical. Most recently he has appeared on the VIVARTE label with
Anner BylsmaAnner Bylsma is a Dutch cellist who plays on both modern and authentic baroque style instruments. He took an interest in music from an early age. He studied with...
in performances of Beethoven's complete cello sonatas (S2K 60761) and with L'Archibudelli in performances of Schubert’s
“Trout” QuintetThe Trout Quintet is the popular name for the Piano Quintet in A major by Franz Schubert. In Otto Erich Deutsch's catalogue of Schubert's works, it is D. 667...
and “Arpeggione” Sonata (SK 63361). Also issued under the VIVARTE label, his recent cycle of Beethoven Piano concertos with Tafelmusik and
Bruno WeilBruno Weil is a symphonic conductor. He is principal guest conductor of Tafelmusik, the period-instrument group based in Toronto, Music Director of the Carmel Bach Festival in California, and artistic director of the period-instrument festival "Klang und Raum" in Irsee, Bavaria...
(Nos. 1 and 2: SK 68250; Nos. 3 and 4: SK 62824; No. 5: SK 63365) elicited praise for his stylistic sensitivity and his musical sensibility. His recording of Mozart’s late piano works—Mozart: The Vienna Years (S2K 62879) -- prompted Classic CD to write that van Immerseel is “among the most winning and authoritative champions of the fortepiano.”