Ilze Grudule was born in Latvia, where she studied cello at the Latvian Academy of Music. The meeting with the Swiss cellist Philippe Mermoud was soon decisive for her further musical career. After completing her studies in Riga, she continued at the Center de Musique Ancienne Mermoud de Genève, majoring in baroque cello. From 2000, she continued her education at the Schola cantorum basiliensis in Basel, Switzerland (in the class of Christoph Coin), in 2004 she graduated with a diploma in the field of early music. As early as 2004, she founded the Kesselberg Ensemble with the aim of presenting renewed premieres of baroque music from Switzerland and Latvia. The Kesselberg Ensemble performs at a number of festivals and has released several first recordings. Ilze also collaborates with the Basel baroque orchestra Capriccio and the ensemble Il Proteo. Ilze is the author and producer of a whole series of audiovisual performances combining baroque elements with contemporary music and modern stage means. Numerous recordings for German radio, Chandos Records, cpo, Symphonia and Philips. In 2005, Ilze founded the baroque music festival in Rezekne, Latvia. Since 2008, he has been teaching as a guest at the Latvian Academy of Music. He also teaches at international master courses at the University of Bogota and at the Academy of Music in Kyiv.
