Rob van de Laar, born in 1987, studied the horn with Herman Jeurissen at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague before furthering his education with Wolfgang Vladár at the University of Music and the Performing Arts in Vienna. Following positions with the Residentie Orchestra in The Hague, the Brussels Philharmonic and the Arnhem Philharmonic, he has been principal horn of the Mozarteum Orchestra in Salzburg since 2016.
As a soloist, he has played concertos by Haydn, Mozart and Strauss with various European orchestras. In January 2019 he made his debut as a soloist with the Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra in the Great Hall of the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam. In 2020 he performed as soloist at the Salzburg Festival with the Mozarteum Orchestra conducted by Andrew Manze. He is also an enthusiastic chamber musician and can be seen regularly at international festivals.
As a guest principal, he appears with major orchestras such as the Concertgebouw Orchestra, the Bavarian State Orchestra, the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, the Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra and the Camerata Salzburg. He has played under conductors such as Bernard Haitink, Mariss Jansons and Nikolaus Harnoncourt.
In 2017 Rob van de Laar was awarded the Dutch Music Prize, the highest award for talented young musicians from the Dutch Ministry of Education, Culture and Science. His debut album Heartfelt – Romantic Works for Horn was released by Challenge Classics. Since 2020 he has been guest professor at the Royal Conservatory The Hague.
