Piet Kee, full name Pieter William Kee, was a Dutch organist and composer. He was born in Zaandam on 30 August 1927, the son of the organist Cor Kee and the occasional singer Wilhelmina Sibbelina Spits. He played the pipe organ, piano, violin and clarinet, and studied with his father before continuing at the Amsterdam Conservatory, where his teachers included Anthon van der Horst. His organ playing earned him the Prix d'Excellence, and he also studied conducting and instrumentation with Piet A. van Mever.
In 1952 Kee became organist of the Great, or St Lawrence, Church in Alkmaar, a post he held until 1986. From 1956 to 1989 he served with Albert de Klerk as Haarlem city organist, regularly playing both Christian Müller's main organ at Haarlem's Great, or St Bavo, Church and the Aristide Cavaillé-Coll organ at the Haarlem Concert Hall. Appointed principal organ teacher at the Amsterdam Music Lyceum in 1954, he taught David Adams, Henco de Berg, Harm Hoeve, Jan Jongepier, Ewald Kooiman, Jos van der Kooy, Jan Van Landeghem, Karl Maureen, Wim de Ruiter, Masaaki Suzuki and Willem van Twillert.
Known for his improvisational skill, Kee won the International Improvisation Competition for Organists in Haarlem three consecutive times, in 1953, 1954 and 1955. He taught for many years at the International Summer Academy for Organists, part of the International Organ Festival Haarlem, and gave concerts throughout Europe, Asia, America and Australia. He also served on juries for international organ competitions, including the 1967 international organ competition in Bruges during the Early Music Festival. His articles on numerical symbolism in ostinati in the Baroque music of Johann Sebastian Bach and Dieterich Buxtehude appeared in the journal The Organ between 1983 and 1986 and were translated into several languages.
Kee's compositions include the organ works Triptych on Psalm 86 (1960), Gedenck-Clanck 76 (1976), Bios (1995), The Organ (2000), Cervus (2006) and Voluntary (2009). His works involving organ and other instruments include Music and Space, Confrontation, Network, Festival Spirit, Bios II, Haarlem Concerto and Performance. Other pieces include the choral works The World and Heaven, the carillon works Frans Hals Suite and Daaaee, and chamber pieces for flute, violin and piano, and wind quintet. For the British label Chandos, he recorded historic organs in the Netherlands, Germany, Denmark and Spain, including organ works by César Franck. He received the Bach Medal from the London Harriet Cohen Foundation in 1960 and an honorary Fellowship of the Royal College of Organists in London in 1988, at the same time as Olivier Messiaen.
Kee married Freya Irma Lydia Lemaire in August 1949; they had three children and later divorced. He subsequently married Els Hendrikse, a Haarlem municipal employee and, until her retirement, an organiser of the International Organ Festival Haarlem. Kee died in Haarlem on 25 May 2018.
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