Biografie Mirjam van Dam in het Nederlands >>
From 1992 to 1993, Mirjam van Dam studied Contemporary Music Theatre at the Amsterdam University of the Arts. From 1993 to 1999, she studied vocals (department jazz & light music) at the Hilversum Conservatory and the Amsterdam Conservatory and graduated with honours. A reporter from newspaper Het Parool, who happened to be present, wrote: ‘A shining career in theatre, that’s what Mirjam van Dam deserves’. In 2011, she got her diploma in conducting from the Utrecht Conservatory.
After her studies, she sang in various threatre, jazz, pop, bigband, salon, chanson and cabaret ensembles. She toured the Netherlands and Asia together with Laura Fygi, made an album titled Ziel (‘Soul’) and won singer-songwriter contest Mooie Noten. She also sang with the Glenn Miller Orchestra, the Bernhard Berkhout Orchestra, the New Jazz Orchestra (Henk Meutgeert), Lex Jasper (former conductor, arranger and pianist at the Metropole Orchestra), Rob Agerbeek and many others. She created various musical productions, such as How to get rid of Bette Midler (about second-generation victimhood), Ella (about the life of Ella Fitzgerald), Dead Singers Society (about the lives of Billie Holiday, Etta James, Judy Garland, Janis Joplin, Whitney Houston and Amy Winehouse) and Let’s Eat! (with Wolf Martini). Together with Jetta Starreveld and Monique de Adelhart Toorop, she created two shows about music during World War II: Door de nacht klinkt een lied (‘A song sounds through the night’; about Conny Stuart, Jetty Paerl and Jetty Cantor) and Hoor de vrouwen zingen (‘Hear the women sing’; about Gisela Söhnlein, Hetty Voûte, Lotty Huffener-Veffer and David Koker). The premiere of Hoor de vrouwen zingen took place at Camp Vught National Memorial.
In order to keep singing and reaching an audience during the covid pandemic, she began the project A song and a story. Sitting at the piano, she recorded videos in which she sang a song and told a story about its origin. A new episode was posted on social media each week. Presently, in 2023, she performs Jewish Jazz (a project about the Jewish history of jazz music, set up by Gary Feingold of KunstenDialoog) and is working on a Yiddish music repertoire and CD with Bob Zimmerman. Together with Lex Jasper, there are plans for a CD in Dutch.
Introduction video A Song and A Story
How to get rid of Bette Midler with Arto Boyadjian
Lead singer bij Loet van der Lee Band – Photo: Rens Groenendijk
Mirjam was touring with Laura Fygi and band through Asia.