Ellen Corver
pianist

Ellen Corver studied with Else Krijgsman and Naum Grubert at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague. Ellen regards preparing performances in close collaboration with composers as being decisive in her formation as a pianist.

At the age of seventeen, she began working with Karlheinz Stockhausen, which led to the first complete recordings of his fourteen Klavierstücke for piano solo for the composers own recordlabel. Not withstanding all the works of such composers as Debussy, Ravel, Brahms, Beethoven and Haydn she is playing, Ellen established a reputation for being an outstanding interpretor of contemporary music. She performed concerto’s by John Cage, György Ligeti and György Kurtág. Klaas de Vries en Theo Verbey wrote new concerto’s for her. In her opinion, being in direct contact with living composers changes the attitude of an interpretor in regard to works of the great masters of the past.

As a soloist, Ellen Corver has performed with a.o. the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, the Dutch Radio Philharmonic Orchestra, the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra , the Asko|Schönberg Ensemble conducted by Jonathan Nott, Markus Stenz, Ed Spanjaard, Jaap van Zweden, Peter Eötvös and Mariss Jansons.

Among the fifteen CD’s she has recorded, many received the highest acclaim by music critics. Her recording of Mantra by Stockhausen, with her piano duo partner Sepp Grotenhuis, was rewarded with an Edison Prize. Her interest in chamber music in general has brought her on stage with musicians like soprano Charlotte Riedijk, clarinettist Lars Wouters van den Oudenweijer and in contemporary music theatre with mezzo soprano Gerrie de Vries.