In 2018 Factotum was released by Thijs de Klijn Quintet, a recording with musicians guitarist Thijs de Klijn (1990, Utrecht) met while living in Berlin. This album was praised by publications such as Jazzenzo and was well received online, with over 150.000 streams on Spotify and Apple Music to show for.

 

Jazzenzo.nl:

 

 "With Factotum, De Klijn jumps right into the deep end without hesitation. His compositions are extraordinarily original, well structured, have surprising twists and are played by excellent musicians - mostly bandleaders in their own right. Thijs de Klijn creates his own voice on his debut."

 

 

Thijs hosted a monthly jazz night in Jozef in Utrecht for 2 1/2 years where he invited different guests each edition. People who joined are Bart Wirtz, Tom Beek, Paul van der Feen, Gideon Tazelaar, Joost van Schaik, Felix Schlarmann and many more.

 

From 2014 he spent two years in Berlin where he expanded the types of music he plays, now ranging from more conventional jazz to free/ambient/noise. In Berlin he wrote the music for Factotum.

He was invited to join Tim V to play and record the Berlin Suite, a piece of music written for people bassist Timothy Verdesca met while being in town for a few months. This band is still active and toured Switzerland and France multiple times.

Before moving to Berlin, one of the projects he was involved in was jazzpop band Femme Vanille with whom he recorded the Coordinates Album in New York and toured the Netherlands and Germany. 

 

During his studies at the Utrecht and Amsterdam conservatories he had lessons with Jesse van Ruller, Maarten van der Grinten, Martijn van Iterson, Reinier Baas, Durk Hijma, Eef Albers, Wim Bronnenberg and Peter Bernstein.