Robert de Bree
Robert de Bree’s research focuses on historically inspired improvisation for melodic instruments. With The Scroll Ensemble they have brought this into concerts for the last 20 years and teach historical improvisation at the KC.
A sample of papers: Sweelinck Symposium (17th-century melodic improvisation, 2021), The Historical Oboe Conference (The 19th-century improvising oboist, 2024), at the Chigiana conference “Performing Classics Today” (mono-thematic fantasias inspired by Czerny, 2024) and at the Open Recorder Days Amsterdam (Storytelling for improvisation teaching, 2019). In 2021 Robert received a scholarship from the Festival de Musique Improvisée de Lausanne to research partimento for melodic instrumentalists, and in 2024 from the Gemeente Den Haag. This was further presented widely at e.g. Koninklijk Vereniging voor Muziekgeschiedenis (2022), Early Music America (2023) and the Partimento Conference at the MDW (2024). They also have a YouTube channel sharing their research with the rest of the world (www.youtube.com/thescrollensemble). They taught workshops all over the world; recently at Conservatories in Riga, Katowice, Vienna, Brussels, Tel Aviv and Frankfurt and at the MentiParti Summer Course in Basel. Robert also performs with leading ensembles and orchestras in their field, such as the English Baroque Soloists, Academy of Ancient Music and Ensemble Pygmalion.
