Martin Fondse (Bergen op Zoom, 1967) plays the piano and Vibrandoneon (the baroque version of the melodica) and is renowned as a jazz and contemporary music composer and arranger.
Fondse studied piano and popular modern music at ArtEZ University of the Arts, Arnhem, and later studied composition at the Cologne Conservatory of Music under Bob Brookmeyer, where he learned to approach arranging as an exercise in “recomposition.” He took piano lessons with Kenny Werner in 1996, and since 2009 has explored the expressive possibilities of the Vibrandoneon in both solo and ensemble performances.
Fondse has a preference for large ensembles and has established several of his own, mostly performing his own compositions – ranging from solo pieces to works for symphony orchestra – characterised by a distinctive humorous, narrative style and a love for blending disparate worlds of sound. His groups include De Achtbaan (later the Martin Fondse Oktemble), founded in the 1990s; the Groove Troopers (2000), a small big band exploring the territory between traditional big-band repertoire and modern dance music; and the Starvinsky Orkestar, renamed the Martin Fondse Orchestra (MFO) in 2013, which combines classical and jazz musicians.
He has received composition commissions from the North Sea Jazz Festival and the VPRO, and has composed and arranged for ensembles including the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, the Metropole Orchestra, the Netherlands Wind Ensemble, and the Big Band of Hessischer Rundfunk.
In recent years he has worked internationally with Lenine, Peter Erskine & Doudou N’Diaye Rose, and Matthew Herbert, and led the Orquestra Tom Jobim (BR). In the Netherlands, he maintains long-standing collaborations with Eric Vloeimans, Mete Erker, Eric van der Westen, and Remy van Kesteren.
Fondse is also a much sought-after mentor and orchestra leader, overseeing XL Jazz and having served as artistic director of the BEAM Orchestra and, from 2015 to 2017, the Sena National Youth Jazz Orchestra (NJJO). He has released twelve albums under his own name and has composed film scores for several animation and feature films.