Kees Koelmans studied violin with Bouw Lemkes and baroque violin with Jaap Schröder at the Sweelinck Conservatorium in Amsterdam, graduating in 1984. He was one of the founders of the Baroque Orchestra of the Netherlands Bach Society. He was a long-time member of the Camerata de Madrid and subsequently worked with the most prominent European Early Music ensembles. Since 1985, he has been a member of Frans Brüggen’s Orchestra of the Eighteenth Century, its many chamber music ensembles bringing him to numerous stages at home and abroad. Additionally he is a member of the early music group Musica Amphion.

He was a violin teacher at the conservatories of Zwolle, Groningen, Arnhem and Antwerp and guest professor at the University of Salamanca. As of the year 2000, he has been a violin and chamber music teacher at the Conservatorium van Amsterdam, where he was appointed Head of Strings in 2012.

Kees Koelmans plays a Hendrik Jacobs violin made in 1669, by courtesy of the Nationaal Muziekinstrumenten Fonds (NMF).