Chris Hinze was born in Hilversum, in the Netherlands. He began his musical studies on the piano at the age of 12. After working as a pianist all over Europe for several years, he returned to Holland and entered the Royal Conservatory in The Hague to study the flute. Around that time he met bass player Dick van der Capellen and together with Cees See/Martin van Duinhoven, they formed the 'Dick van der Capellen trio'. ('The Present is Past'). After getting his degree at the Royal Conservatory in 1969, Chris won a scholarship to the prestigious Berklee College of Music in Boston to study composition and arranging. Whilst at Berklee, he started to produce his unique Baroque/Jazz albums 'Telemann my Way', 'Vivat Vivaldi' etc. He also founded the 'Chris Hinze Combination.

In the early seventies Hinze also started to travel to far eastern countries like Indonesia, India and Japan. Studying ragas in Bombay (1974) with bansuri bamboo flute player Raghunath Seth and playing and improvising together with musicians from these cultures formed the foundation of Hinze’s pioneering style, which would now be called ‘world music’: for examples see the recordings made in 1974 in Tokyo with shakuhachi player Hozan Yamamoto: Kyorai, Keden and Mange (sadly no longer available). Later Hinze invited his teacher Raghunath Seth back to Europe for concert tours. They recorded many CD’s together, all available on the Keytone label.