To close the 2024–25 theatre season, the VSCD Classical Music Jury has announced the nominees in the running for De Ovatie (The Ovation) 2025. From a rich and diverse selection, the jury has chosen three impressive stage performances.

Jaap van Zweden was chief conductor of the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra for 12 years. Now he bids farewell with a tour of Europe with Rachmaninoff’s Second Symphony and Roukens’ acclaimed double concert In Unison with piano brothers Lucas and Arthur Jussen.

In composer Joey Roukens’ virtuoso “Second Violin Concerto”, not a single note is superfluous The new Joey Roukens, his Second Violin Concerto, is at least as good as his earlier work. It is to be hoped that violinist Simone Lamsma may play the piece very often.

My Violin Concerto ‘Out of the Deep’, written for violinist Simone Lamsma and the Radio Filharmonisch Orkest, is actually my second violin concerto. In 2016, I wrote a concerto for violin and chamber ensemble called Roads to Everywhere (for violinist Joseph Puglia).

Con Spirito is an overture for orchestra in which Joey Roukens showcases his most joyful and exuberant side. Although this aspect is not new to listeners familiar with his work—such as the first part of his double piano concerto In Unison or the first part of Boundless—he has never presented this side as extensively before.

Under the direction of Antony Hermus and with soloist Boris Giltburg (piano), the NJO dares to perform an adventurous, breakneck, breathtaking program. Rachmaninov’s fourth piano concerto, Joey Roukens’ Night Flight and Stravinsky’s Petrushka are on the music stands.

Gemma Bond is choreographing a new ballet for the Royal Ballet’s Festival of New Choreography. The ballet is based on ‘In Unison’, a composition by Joey Roukens for two pianos and orchestra.

Recently, Joey Roukens was interviewed by classical music journalist Joep Stapel for the contemporary music magazine Hémisphère son (Hemisphere Sound). The interview can be read here.

The Dudok Quartet’s latest album, What Remains, is a musical journey through time and place that showcases its unique approach to music-making. With a mix of old and new repertoire spanning almost a thousand years, the album seeks to find the deepest meaning in each piece of music and offer a fresh perspective on each […]

The Pan Asian Awards were presented for the first time at Capital C in Amsterdam on Friday night. In the three different categories, composer Joey Roukens, biomedical engineer and fashion designer Dan Jing Wu and writer and journalist Haroon Ali picked up awards Roukens won the Pan Asian Award.

Following the successes of Narnia and GRIMM, Dorian (14+) is the third joint production by choreographers Ernst Meisner and Marco Gerris. For their adaptation of The Picture of Dorian Gray, the famous book by Oscar Wilde from 1891, the two choreographers have opted for a thriller-like approach, filled with tension and suspense, for adults and […]

The Dutch newspaper Het Parool has selected the Bosch Requiem as the best classical performance of 2022. It was written for Amsterdam Sinfonietta and the Nederlands Kamerkoor and performed in the Muziekgebouw aan ‘t IJ and in Den Bosch as the opening of the November Music Festival.

What were the best concerts and albums of the year? In their personal top 5s, NRC reviewers look back at 2022.

Joey Roukens has written a work for piano solo called ‘Christmas Sonata’. Each particle is (very freely) based on a Christmas carol.

For those who missed the concerts, you can now listen back to my Requiem on YouTube. Just click here.

“Joey Roukens’ Requiem is a captivating, tightly ordered chaos”. Another Roukens! Composer Joey Roukens (1982) recently premiered his First Symphony with great success.

“I wanted to write a requiem for a long time,” says Dutch composer Joey Roukens. “When I was an adolescent, I used to be bowled over by the requiems of Mozart, Cristóbal de Morales and Cherubini’s first requiem.

(photo by Eduardus Lee) On October 14 and 15, the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra performed Symphony No. 1 of Joey Roukens.