Pianist and musicologist Ralph van Raat (1978) studied the piano with Prof. Ton Hartsuiker and Prof. Willem Brons at the Conservatory of Amsterdam and Musicology at the University of Amsterdam. During his piano studies, which he concluded “Cum Laude” (With Distinction) in 2002, Van Raat was admitted to “The Provision for Outstanding Musicians”, a special training course offered alongside the regular curriculum. He also concluded his musicology studies with the mention “Cum Laude” in 2003. As a part of the Advanced Programme of the Conservatory of Amsterdam, and with help of the Dutch cultural trust ‘Prins Bernhard Cultuurfonds’, Van Raat also studied with Claude Helffer in Paris, with Ursula Oppens at Chicago’s Northwestern University, with Liisa Pohjola in Finland and with Pierre-Laurent Aimard at the Musikhochschule in Cologne.
Van Raat has won the Second Prize and Donemus-Prize (for Contemporary Music) of the Princess Christina Competition (1995); the Stipend-Prize Darmstadt during the “Internationale Ferienkurse fur Neue Musik” in Darmstadt (Germany, 1998); First Prize of the International Gaudeamus Interpreters Competition (1999); the Philip Morris Arts Award (2003); the Elisabeth Everts Prize (2005); the international Borletti-Buitoni Fellowship (2005); VSCD Classical Music Prize (2005); the Fortis MeesPierson Award of the Concertgebouw, Amsterdam (2006) and the Prijs Klassiek (‘Classics Prize’) of the Dutch radio and television broadcaster NTR (2010).
Van Raat appears as a recitalist in The Netherlands and abroad, in Europe, the Middle East and Asia as well as the United States. Besides the traditional classical repertoire, he takes special interest in the performance of contemporary classical music. Many of his concerts have been broadcasted by Dutch as well as foreign radio and television networks. He was given his own radio series about contemporary classical music for the Dutch national broadcasting company, and his own concert series by a.o. the Concertgebouw of Amsterdam, the Muziekgebouw in Amsterdam and De Doelen in Rotterdam.
Van Raat also performed as a soloist with orchestras including London Sinfonietta, the BBC Symphony Orchestra, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra and Radio Chamber Philharmonic, the Radio Symphony Orchestra of Frankfurt, the Aarhus Symphony Orchestra and the Dortmunder Philharmoniker. Van Raat was Artist-in-Residence of The Netherlands Symphony Orchestra in 2010. He worked closely with conductors such as Valery Gergiev, JoAnn Falletta, David Robertson, Peter Eötvös, Stefan Asbury, Michel Tabachnik, Jac van Steen and Otto Tausk.
He played as a soloist at important festivals such as at the symphonic opening concert of the Gergiev Festival, the BBC Proms, the Hong Kong Arts Festival (as part of the prestigious Credit Suisse Emerging Artist Series), the Festival International de Musique de Besançon, the Holland Festival, the Time of Music festival in Viitasaari, Finland, the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival in the UK, the Berliner Festspiele and the Tanglewood Summer Festival in the United States. (read more at Ralph van Raat official site