Interview with a Dutch jazz musician
Wiek Hijmans (1967) is a Dutch electric guitarist and composer influenced by jazz and rock. He is also one of the pioneers who used electric guitar in contemporary classical music. Hijmans has played the guitar since he was eleven years old. In 1991, he received his diploma at Sweelinck Conservatorium in Amsterdam as performing musician. In 1997, he obtained the Professional Studies Certificate at the Manhattan School of Music in New York, under David Starobin. He received the Andres Segovia Award for his ‘extraordinary guitar playing’ in the same year. With a Fulbright scholarship, he could further perfect his education.
He worked as a sideman for improvising musicians like John Zorn, Derek Bermel, Anthony Braxton, Ernst Reijseger, Peter van Bergen, Roscoe Mitchell, Nick Didkovsky, Oene van Geel and Peter Kowald. He performed with violinist Anna McMichael, the Maarten Altena Ensemble, the Orchestra De Volharding, and classical orchestras like the Brooklyn Philharmonic Orchestra, the Nieuw Sinfoniëtta Amsterdam, the Ebony Band and the Mondrian String Quartet.
He was commissioned by the ‘Fonds voor de Scheppende Toonkunst’ several times to do a composition for them.
Playlist:
The Police, Bring on the night
Trio Raaven, Earl of Essex
G. Kurtag, a Kis Csava
Wiek Hijmans, From here to there and no return
Altena Ensemble and Remco Campert, Signo
Elastic Jargon featuring violinist Mark Feldman, French Summer
