Royal Conservatoire Big Band together with soloist Toon Roos, main subject teacher saxophone, clarinet and flute

Toon Roos is regarded as one of the best saxophonists in Europe, because of his lyrical, intuitive and balanced way of playing and his strong personality as a band leader and composer. Toon has always played various styles of music, from big band swing to bebop and hard bop, from bossa nova to funk and fusion. He has performed and recorded with many jazz greats including Joe Zawinul, John Scofield, Peter Erskine, Toots Thielemans and Ivan Lins. The Toon Roos Quartet toured Europe as the opening show for Steely Dan. Toon has won several jazz awards, including the Bird Award from the North Sea Jazz Festival.

The Big Band comprises five saxophones, four trombones, four trumpets and a rhythm section with drums, guitar, bass and piano. The Big Band’s repertoire, which consists of arrangements written by teachers and (former) students of the Jazz department, has expanded enormously over the years. The arrangements encompass a hugely diverse range of musical styles and ideas.

The Royal Conservatoire Big Band has been around for a long time. It was formed in the mid-1970s when students and teachers decided to form the Royal Conservatoire’s own big band. At the end of the Seventies, jazz pianist and arranger Frans Elsen became its first permanent conductor. In a manner of speaking, the Royal Conservatoire’s Jazz department, which was established in the middle of 1979, has its origins in that big band. From the beginning of the 1990s the Big Band scaled new musical heights under the American clarinetist and saxophonist John Ruocco and since then has appeared at the North Sea Jazz Festival more than twenty times.

John Ruocco, conductor

Toon Roos, tenor saxophone

Sarah Raabe, vocals
Zoë de Priester, vocals

Giancarlo Morbeck, trumpet 1
Reinis Ausmanis, trumpet 2
Niccoló Angioni, trumpet 3
Pedro Henriques Lopes, trumpet 4

Yiannis Marinos, trombone 1
Gerard Piera, trombone 2
Matjaž Kafol, trombone 3
Hugo Nóbrega Santos, trombone 4

ChakSeng Lam, alto saxophone 1
Antonio Jesús Onieva Beato, alto saxophone 2
Jaume Pineda Soler, tenor saxophone 1
José Catalá González, tenor saxophone 2
Enrico D'Addazio, baritone saxophone

Dongkyu Shon, guitar
Daniel Sueiro Martinez-Collado, piano
Vasileios Gkagkavouzis, double bass
Francesco Parsi, drums