Ilse Eerens

Born in Maasmechelen, Belgium, Ilse Eerens studied with Lieve Jansen at the Lemmens Institute in Leuven and with Jard van Nes at the Dutch National Opera Academy. Early in her career, she appeared in Schoenberg’s Moses und Aron at the Ruhrtriennale; she made her debut at the Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie in Brussels in 2011 in Wagner’s Parsifal. Subsequent engagements have taken her to the Royal Opera House in London, Zurich Opera, the Salzburg and Bregenz Festivals, the Theater an der Wien, and the Opéra de Lyon. Career highlights include the world premiere of Toshio Hosokawa’s Natasha at the National Theatre in Tokyo, where she sang the title role; a residency at the Oregon Bach Festival; Honegger’s Jeanne d’Arc au bûcher with the hr-Sinfonieorchester under Alain Altinoglu; and Mahler’s Eighth Symphony in Brussels. In the 2026-27 season, she returns to Japan’s Takefu International Music Festival, performs Hans Abrahamsen’s let me tell you with the Orchestre National de Metz, and appears in Bach’s St. Matthew Passion with the Residentie Orkest The Hague under Jan Willem de Vriend. Ilse Eerens has worked with conductors including Laurence Equilbey, Hartmut Haenchen, Philippe Herreweghe, Ton Koopman, Riccardo Muti, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Kazushi Ono, and Lorenzo Viotti. Her repertoire ranges from Baroque oratorio to contemporary music theater. In 2024, she was appointed coordinator of the Voice Department at the Royal Conservatoire in The Hague.

August 2026