Rijnvos studied composition at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague with January van Vlijmen and Brian Ferneyhough. He received a German Academic Exchange Service scholarship and attended a postgraduate course at the Musikhochschule in Freiburg.
In 1994 he took part in the International Course for Professional Choreographers and Composers at Bretton Hall (Wakefield, United Kingdom). Contacts with Morton Feldman and John Cage between 1986-1992 were a major influence on his development. Rijnvos has also been influenced by the works of artists outside of music such as William South. Burroughs, Samuel Beckett, Joseph Beuys and Italo Calvino.
In October 2009 Rijnvos was appointed Head of Composition in the Department of Music at the University of Durham.
He is also chairman of the Union of Composers in the Netherlands, and artistic advisor of the Ives Ensemble, of which he was managing director between 1991 and 2000.
