Born 7 January 1978 in the Netherlands, Janine Jansen is one of the world’s great violin players. She began to study the violin at the age of six after first considering the cello. She appeared as a soloist with the National Youth Orchestra of Scotland in 2001 when she performed the Brahms Violin Concerto. With an enviable international reputation, violinist Janine Jansen works regularly with the world’s most eminent orchestras and conductors. Jensen is described by the New York Times as being as “riveting in silence as in sound”. Orchestral highlights in season 18/19 include engagements with Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra (Gergiev), Orchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks (Fischer), Orchestre de Paris (Harding), Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchester (Bychkov) and London Philharmonic (Jurowski).
Janine records exclusively for Decca Classics and since recording Vivaldi’s Four Seasons back in 2003 she has been extremely successful in the digital music charts. Her discography includes performances of Bartok’s Violin Concerto No. 1 with London Symphony Orchestra and Brahms’ Violin Concerto with the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia conducted by Sir Antonio Pappano. Other highlights include a recording of Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto No. 2 with London Philharmonic Orchestra and Vladimir Jurowski, Beethoven and Britten with Paavo Järvi, Mendelssohn and Bruch with Riccardo Chailly, Tchaikovsky with Daniel Harding as well as an album of Bach Concertos with her own ensemble. Janine has also released a number of chamber music discs, including Schubert’s String Quintet and Schönberg’s Verklärte Nacht and Sonatas by Debussy, Ravel and Prokofiev with pianist Itamar Golan.
Janine has won numerous prizes, including four Edison Klassiek Awards, the Preis der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik, NDR Musikpreis for outstanding artistic achievement and the Concertgebouw Prize. She has been given the VSCD Klassieke Muziekprijs for individual achievement and the Royal Philharmonic Society Instrumentalist Award for performances in the UK. In September 2015 she was awarded the Bremen MusikFest Award. Janine studied with Coosje Wijzenbeek, Philipp Hirshhorn and Boris Belkin.
Jansen currently plays the 1707 Stradivarius “Rivaz – Baron Gutmann” violin kindly on loan from Dextra Musica.
