Mathieu van Bellen was born in the Netherlands and started his violin studies with Nico Baltussen, he continued with Jan Repko at Chethams School of Music in Manchester, then at the Royal College of Music in London with Itzhak Rashkovsky and at the Hochschule für Musik in Berlin, with Ulf Wallin.
Laureate of Yehudi Menuhin Competition, Wieniawski Competition, Prinses Christina Competition and Oskar Back Competition he was also awarded the Bach Prize and the String Player of the Year 2008 at the Royal College of Music. He has performed as a soloist with National Orchestra of Belgium, Gelders Orkest, Holland Symfonia, Southbank Sinfonia, PHION, Camerata Athena, amongst others.
With the Busch Trio he performs through Europe, the US and Asia, regularly appearing in halls like Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, Berlin’s Konzerthaus, Brussel’s BOZAR, as well as on numerous national radio channels, as well as having recorded the complete chamber works with piano by Dvorak, Schubert, and most recently trios by Ravel&Shostakovich.
He has also recorded solo and chamber music CDs, most notably his arrangement in collaboration with Mathias Halvorsen of Puccini’s La Bohème for violin and piano, which received several 5 star reviews in international newspapers.
Mathieu is currently teaching at the Amsterdam Conservatoire and is First Concertmaster of Phion Orchestra. He is also a founder of MuziekHaven, a chamber music centre in Zaandam which he runs together with his wife Maria Milstein, as well as taking over the Reizend MuziekGezelschap from Christiaan Bor. He’s the founder and artistic director of Scaldis Chamber Music Festival since 2014.
Mathieu plays on the ex-Adolf Busch G.B. Guadagnini violin (Turin, 1783), as well as a Dominique Peccatte bow.
