Willem Andriessen
Willem Christiaan Nicolaas Andriessen (25 October 1887 – 29 March 1964) was a Dutch composer, conductor, and pianist. He was born in Haarlem and died in Amsterdam at the age of 76 after becoming unwell during a piano examination.
He was the son of Nico Andriessen, an organist, choir conductor, and composer, and the painter Gesine Vester. His brothers were the composer Hendrik Andriessen and the sculptor Mari Andriessen; his grandfather was the painter Willem Vester. He received his first musical instruction from his father.
From 1903, Andriessen studied piano with Jean-Baptiste de Pauw and composition with Bernard Zweers at the Amsterdam Conservatory, graduating in 1906. On the advice of Daniël de Lange and De Pauw, he continued his studies and received the Prix d'Excellence in 1908, performing his Piano Concerto in D-flat major, Ludwig van Beethoven's Fifth Piano Concerto, and other smaller works.
Between 1908 and 1910, he appeared as a soloist in Berlin, Frankfurt am Main, Dresden, Leipzig, and several Dutch cities. He declined an invitation in April 1910 to become head of a musical institution in Baltimore. That year, he became a piano teacher at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague and at the Rotterdam Conservatory. In 1937, he succeeded Sem Dresden as director of the Amsterdam Conservatory.
Andriessen composed orchestral, sacred, vocal, choral, and piano music. His works include an Overture in C major (1905), a Piano Concerto in D-flat major (1908), the piano Sonata (1934), Praeludia (1942–50), Sonatina (1945), and Prelude for the Left Hand (1960). His sacred music includes a Mass in E-flat major, Sub tuum praesidium for male chorus (1943), Salve coeli digna (1944), Ave Maria for female chorus (1954), Exsultate deo (1954), and Missa Brevis for SATB choir (1963).
In 1962, an anthology of his writings on musical subjects, Mensen in de muziek, was published in the Haarlems Dagblad.