Jeff (b. 1992) completed a unique bachelor’s and master’s degree at the Amsterdam Conservatory, studying under flamenco guitarist Eric Vaarzon Morel as his principal teacher, alongside courses with widely respected flamenco guitarists such as Manolo Sanlúcar, José Antonio Rodríguez, Manolo Franco, Paco Serrano and Tomatito. He toured Spain with the Pablo Martinez Flamenco Jazz Band, performed with Mascha van Nieuwkerk on the main stage of the Uitmarkt, toured the Netherlands with the Nederlands Blazers Ensemble’s ‘Troubadours’, played New Year’s concerts with the NBE, and has performed in prestigious Dutch concert halls including the Concertgebouw, Muziekgebouw Eindhoven, Ahoy and the Bimhuis.
His flamenco concerts are always some kind of crossover. With cellist Mascha van Nieuwkerk he plays the programme Between Us, and now and then he shares the stage with flamenco dancer Conchita Boon.
Alongside flamenco, rock has always played a big part in Jeff’s life. As a teenager he played electric guitar in a couple of punk rock bands, but after secondary school he committed fully to flamenco and put the electric guitar aside. By the end of his conservatory studies he realised how much he missed rock, and gradually let it back in, at first through the occasional unusual project. The turning point was the musical De Man van La Mancha starring Huub van der Lubbe, for which he wrote the flamenco guitar music and in which he played both flamenco and electric guitar. Since 2026 Jeff has been lead guitarist of The Dutch Bryan Adams, touring theatres across the Netherlands with the show The Best of Bryan Adams.
In 2018 Jeff was one of five winners of the YAA Award (Young Artsupport Amsterdam), an annual prize awarded to young, exceptional artists in film, music, theatre and art. With the prize money, Jeff independently produced his second CD, ‘Reflejos del Alma’. This album, meaning ‘reflections of the soul’, is a musical journey through Jeff Heijne’s world: an idiosyncratic guitarist seeking to blur the boundaries between flamenco and other musical styles.
In his self-written and arranged compositions, he tells of formative experiences that have shaped his development as a person and as a guitarist. Guitar in hand, he takes on stereotypes, existing conventions and themes such as loneliness, love and escaping reality.