Bio

[color="olive"]Raised a musician's son (his father was the late Dutch arranger, director and film score composer Rogier van Otterloo), Thijs's interest in music developed very early. Next to that, he seemed to have great musical ears and perfect pitch. At 12, he started to play the saxophone, infected by the David Sanborn-flu. It was also then, when he began to write his own music. At 16, he did his first directing job (with the local Fanfare Youth Orchestra). Thijs graduated, in 1998, on Composition and Jazz Saxophone at the Utrecht Conservatory. In the mean time, he had already been assigned for many compositions and orchestral arrangements; many would follow in the years after. He also started conducting his own bigband for a period of more than ten years. Many years later, he founded his own group; having a wide classical harmonic background, complemented with a very funk-influenced timing, and inspired by great jazz soloists like Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter, Miles Davis, John Coltrane etc, and with the best possible fellow musicians, he finally was able to perform his own compositions -which had become quite numerous over the years-. In 2007, 'Miles Away' is his debut album, and definitely a start of many (good) things to come! More info at [/color][link="http://www.thijsvanotterloo.nl"]www.thijsvanotterloo.nl[/link]