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Various 20^th century composers felt the need to historically legitimise their innovations. The innovations in 20^th century music did not occur at random or as a result of anarchy. They are a logical link in the development of music. Both the neo-classicism of Marcel Poot and Jean Françaix and the use of dodecaphony by August Verbesselt can be understood as a deeper reflection of 18th and 19th century tradition. Both movements were a reaction to the pathetic character of Romanticism, in which the individual moment of feeling was consciously (over)accentuated. Whereas neo-classicism reverted to composition techniques from the 18^th and 19^th centuries, the use of atonality and dodecaphony was caused by the search for an alternative system for pitch organisation. Tonal harmony, which experienced a huge expansion at the end of the 19^th century, did not seem capable of doing this anymore. 

 

 

Walter Boeykens (°1938)

 

Walter Boeykens was born in Bornem in 1938 and studied the clarinet at the Royal Conservatory in Brussels. His career really took off after he left the Philharmonic Orchestra of the Belgian broadcasting cooperation, BRT, in 1984. Since then, he worked with the most renowned conductors and ensembles and played a hugely varied repertoire, which included masterpieces from the classical and romantic periods at the beginning of his career as well as contemporary works. As early as 1965, Boeykens was a prize winner at the International Competition for Contemporary Music in Utrecht and in 1968 Pierre Boulez entrusted him with the creation of his Domaines for clarinet and orchestra. Slightly less than twenty years later, August Verbesselt dedicated his concerto for clarinet to him. Boeykens also attended various big music festivals in Berlin, Paris, Warsaw, Madrid, Salzburg and Wallonia and of course the Flanders Festival. As a soloist, he made music with various orchestras in Israel, the US, Venezuela, Mexico, Japan and Korea...

In addition to his career as a clarinet player, Boeykens is also a well-known educator and conductor. As an educator, Boeykens worked for the Antwerp Royal Conservatory, where he established the Walter Boeykens Clarinet Choir, and taught at the Rotterdam Conservatory, the Académie Internationale d’Eté in Nice, the Cité de la Musique in Paris and the Scuola di Alto Perfezionamente Musicale in Turin. As a conductor he led organisations such as the Flanders Philharmonic, the National Orchestra of Belgium, the Brabant Orchestra in the Netherlands and the Orchestra Filharmonica di Torino.

Walter Boeykens was awarded various prizes: the Fifth Prudens Van Duyseprijs in 1988, the Special Culture Prize of Bornem municipality in 1995 and the Flemish government Golden Penny in 1996. King Albert II crowned Boeykens' entire musical career by knighting him in 1997. In November 2007, he was awarded the title ““Maestro Honoris Causa” at Hogeschool Antwerpen by the Antwerp Conservatory Foundation.”

  

 

Jean René Désiré Françaix (1912-1997)

23^rd May, Le Mans – 25^th September, Paris

 

Jean Françaix' parents were both active in music and were responsible for his first musical training: his mother was a singer and the founder of a famous choir and his father was a composer, pianist, musicologist and the director of the Le Mans Conservatory. Françaix created his first composition at the age of six, a short suite for piano, Pour Jacqueline, which as published in 1922.  On the advice of Maurice Ravel, Françaix went tot the Paris Conservatory. He studied piano with Isidore Philipp and won a Premier Prix in 1930. Françaix was an excellent pianist and regularly performed his own works. He was taught harmony and composition by Nadia Boulanger, who considered Françaix as one of her best students. She taught him his sense of form and live structure, two characteristics that are typical of his entire body of work. Françaix was active as a composer throughout his life and his rich, varied body of work includes more than 200 pieces. Especially towards the end of his life, Françaix received many prizes, including the Ludwig-Spohr-Preis in 1979, the Grand Prix Arthur Honegger and the Grand Prix SACEM de la Musique Symphonique in 1992.

 

Concerto for clarinet (1967)

Jean Françaix can be easily placed within French tradition. An admirer of Maurice Ravel, Igor Stravinsky, Les Six and Domenico Scarlatti, he preferred traditional genres such as concertos, symphonies and cantates. Françaix considered atonality as deadlock and proudly called himself a neo-classicist. The 1986 clarinet concerto is therefore mainly tonal, although harmonically speaking it is very free. The Allegro is characterised by a sense of spontaneity, humour and irony and continuously repeats short, simple motifs in various forms. Towards the end of the first part, after the reprise of the main theme, we hear an extensive, improvisational and playful cadenza.  The use of a cadenza is entirely in line with the traditional 18^th century concerto and is the moment when the soloist is given complete freedom to show his virtuosity. Originally the concerto consisted of three parts (fast - slow - fast), but from the end of the 19th century, the addition of a scherzo or a scherzando also became customary under the influence of Ludwig von Beethoven. The Scherzando in Françaix’ concerto is characterised by striking rhythmical dynamics. Syncopes and accents diffuse the metre at weaker moments and could be considered an influence from Stravinsky, although they do not share his complexity. The short Andantino is a moment of peace amongst the three fast parts, in which the same theme is repeated in various forms by both the clarinet and the other instruments in the orchestra in combination with virtuoso graces in other parts. The Allegrissimo with its spontaneous and playful character links in perfectly with the first part, from which the main them is reprised. Just like the previous parts, the Allegrissimo is notably virtuoso for both the clarinet and the orchestra and again uses short themes and motifs that are varied and repeated.

Françaix’ concerto is generally characterised by a sense of humour and spontaneity and although his composition style very clearly built on the history and style of French music, Françaix succeeded in creating his own aesthetics.

 

 

August Verbesselt (1919)

22^nd October, Klein-Willebroek

 

August Verbesselt studied flute, counterpoint and fugue at the Antwerp Conservatory. Since 1942 he was first flautist at the orchestra of the Flemish Opera for nearly forty years. In 1955 Verbesselt was appointed harmony teacher at the Antwerp Conservatory. He devoted himself to introduce subjects like the analysis and theory of musical forms, which he taught from 1960. Verbesselt is generally praised as a composer and educator. His most famous students include composers Jan Pieter Biesemans, Alain Craens and Wilfried Westerlinck. In 1965 he became the director of the Niel school of music.

 

Concerto for clarinet (December 1982)

With respect to composition style, August Verbesselt's body of work can be divided into two periods. The first period (1940-1967) is characterised by the use of extended tonality and a tendency to free atonality. During this period, Verbesselt was inspired by compositions by Béla Bartòk, which is clearly noticeable in his concerto for flute, two percussionists and orchestra (1952). Since the sixties, his work gradually moved away from traditionalism, which resulted in the use of bitonality and polytonality. The concerto for clarinet was written during the second period (1967-1995), in which Verbesselt used dodecaphonic series as basic material for his compositions. In the concerto for clarinet (“Concerto per clarinetto”) of 1982, this basic material consists of fourteen different 12-tone series. Still his compositions are always characterised by the will to be understandable to the audience. The need to be understood can be attributed to Verbesselt's affinity with compositional principles and models from the past. He did not consciously look for contrasts, but sought harmonic and melodic recognisability, so that he occasionally had to deviate from theoretical standards. In the concerto for clarinet, this recognisability is created by repeating short themes and motifs, which makes the music accessible for the listener at all times.

The short introduction (Introduzione) by the orchestra immediately sets the tone of the Allegro's character. The combination of harp, celesta, bongos and congas with the long tones produced by the wind section and the tremolos in the strings creates an ominous atmosphere that keeps on returning in the Allegro as well. 

The clarinet plays an expressive part in the quiet Adagio. Against a background of the orchestra's tremolos, arpeggios and glissandos, the clarinet plays short and melodic motifs. The combination of instruments also creates a specific atmosphere here. The traditional orchestra sound is enriched with various percussion instruments throughout the composition. In the Adagio it is mainly the combination of xylophone, vibraphone, celesta and harp that creates the mysterious atmosphere.

Like the first section, the clarinet part of the Allegro is very virtuoso. Fast note values, large melodic jumps and glissandos give the part its lively character, but that same mysterious undertone from the previous sections remains present.

 

 

Marcel Poot (1901-1988)

7^th May, Vilvoorde – 12^th June, Brussels

 

Marcel Poot, son of Jan Poot (director of the Royal Flemish Theatre), was given his first music lessons from organist Gerard Nauwelaerts. From 1916 to 1919, Poot followed general musical training, piano and harmony at the Brussels Royal Conservatory. In 1922 he won first prize in counterpoint and in 1924 he won first prize in fugue at the Antwerp Royal Conservatory. He was also a private student with Paul Gilson for composition and orchestration. Both composers established and published La Revue Musicale Belge (°1925). Together with 7 of Gilson's other students, Poot formed the group Les Synthétistes. Their aim was to synthesise the achievements of the musical evolutions of the time without losing their own individuality. In 1930 Poot received the Rubens Prize, which gave him the opportunity to be taught by Paul Dukas at the École Normale de Musique in Paris. Poot started his career as a teacher at state secondary school and as a teacher of piano, general musical training and musical history at the academy of Vilvoorde. From 1940 he taught counterpoint and harmony at the Brussels Conservatory and in 1946 he became director there. Poot also held various other important positions. He was a lecturer at the Institut Supérieur des Arts Décoratifs, rector at the Queen Elisabeth College of Music, president of the jury at the Queen Elisabeth Music Competition and a member of the jury at various composition competitions.  

 

Clarinet concerto (1977)

Marcel Poot wanted to create a synthesis of old and new techniques in his music. He had a lot of respect and esteem for the Western European music tradition, particularly for Bach's counterpoint and Mozart's spontaneity. Poot's desire to maintain this tradition resulted in a preference for classical composition principles, such as thematic work, motivic development and the selection of sonata form principles (contrasting themes and three movements). In this respect, Poot can be seen as a neo-classicist, although unlike Jean Françaix, he never saw himself as being part of this or any other style.

 

Poot's first sources of inspiration came from the film and jazz cultures, but several of his works, such as the clarinet concerto of 1977, were influenced by Maurice Ravel, Igor Stravinsky and Richard Strauss. Although he hardly ever went beyond the boundaries of tonality, Poot's works also show early 20^th century influences and both the Allegro risoluto and the other parts show modern harmonic principles (such as an increasing degree of dissonance). The Andante uses the traditional three-part structure, of which the middle part is an Allegro deciso. This Allegro is quick and lively and therefore in sharp contrast with the two other parts, which use free imitation to form a kind of contrapuntal web. The Presto e vigoroso, which alternates rhythmical passages and virtuoso clarinet solos, seems to be influenced by Stravinsky because of its lively rhythm. The piece is interrupted by a Poco più moderato, which again uses an imitative passage between clarinet, bassoon, hobo and flute and is therefore reminiscent of the Andante.

Poots entire body of work is characterised by the conscious avoidance of existing systems and the absence of any form of routine. Poot's motto was that "everything that is the system leads to "barrenness" and could be interpreted as a criticism of the principles of dodecaphony and serialism.

                                  

 

Fernand Terby (1928-2004)

 

Fernand Terby studied at the Brussels Royal Conservatory. He was awarded the first prizes for cello and chamber music and won the H. Cutsen Prize for cello in 1950. Terby created an international career as a cellist, but he became most famous as a conductor. In 1953 he won the La Monnaie conductors' competition after which he headed an ensemble performing popular light opera pieces at the Alhambra theatre of La Monnaie. One year later Terby won the conductors' competition of the Belgian broadcasting cooperation BRT and was appointed conductor of the broadcasting cooperation orchestra. In 1963 he became the conductor of the Variety and Festival Orchestra of the broadcasting cooperation and thee years later he became first conductor at the broadcasting cooperation. Terby proved his professional abilities at the broadcasting orchestras and in 1978 he was appointed permanent chief conductor of the BRT Philharmonic Orchestra. Terby was mainly appreciated for his legendary huge repertoire, from popular music to creations of new music, and for his numerous recordings of Flemish music, mostly recorded in the renowned Studio 4 at Flagey square in Brussels. In addition to his activities as a conductor, Terby was a lecturer at the Antwerp Royal Flemish Conservatory.

 

 

Mendi Rodan (°1929)

 

Mendi Rodan was born in Yassi, Romania. He studied the violin and conducting with Constantin Silvestri at the Bucharest Music Academy and became chief conductor at Romanian Radio Broadcasting in 1953. Rodan and his family immigrated to Israel in 1961. Shortly afterwards he made his debut at the Ramat Gan Chamber Orchestra in Israel. Since then Rodan has been very active within Israeli cultural life. His career as a conductor is vast and extremely varied. He was chief conductor and musical director of the Jerusalem Symphonic Orchestra, founder of the Jerusalem Chamber Orchestra, musical director of the Israeli Sinfonietta, musical director and permanent conductor at the Belgian National Orchestra, conductor at the Arthur Rubinstein Piano Master Competition and the Harp International Competition in Israel, etc. Rodan was also a regular guest conductor at the most prestigious orchestras in Europe, the US, China, Venezuela, Brazil, South Africa, Mexico and Canada and worked with the most eminent soloists, such as Arthur Rubinstein, Mstislav Rostropovich, Isaac Stern, Itzhak Perlman, Daniel Barenboim, Jacqueline Du Prez and many others. In addition to his activities as a conductor, Rodan also held various academic positions. He was a guest lecturer at universities such as Bloomington and Brigham Young in the United States and at the Conservatoire Supérieur in Paris. In 1997 the Israeli Ministry of Education and Culture declared Rodan Musician of the Year.

 

Sara Joukes

 

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