Flor Alpaerts (

Antwerp Antwerp (; ; ) is a City status in Belgium, city and a Municipalities of Belgium, municipality in the Flemish Region of Belgium. It is the capital and largest city of Antwerp Province, and the third-largest city in Belgium by area at , after ...

, 12 September 1876 –

, 5 October 1954) was a Belgian conductor, pedagogue and composer. He graduated from the ''Vlaamse Muziekschool'' in 1901. He was artistic director of the Peter Benoit Foundation, co-director of the Royal Flemish Opera and a member of the

Royal Academy of Belgium The Royal Academies for Science and the Arts of Belgium (RASAB) is a non-governmental association that promotes and organises science and the arts in Belgium by coordinating the national and international activities of its constituent academies su ...

. As a composer he became the leading Flemish impressionist, with the symphonic poem ''Pallieter'' (1921-1924). Alpaerts left behind an extensive body of work. He first composed in an impressionist style, later expressionist, and finally neo-classical. He drew his inspiration from Flemish life. Peter Benoit was his great model, but he adapted Benoit's principles and gave Flemish music a modern mode of expression and a contemporary face. He wrote above all for the symphony orchestra, but he also wrote incidental music, an opera, many Flemish songs, chamber music and work for brass bands and wind ensembles. Notable students include the two composers, Denise Tolkowsky and Ernest Schuyten.

Works

* ''Psyché'' (1899), symphonic poem * ''Herleving'' (1904) * ''Cyrus'' (1905) inspired by a work by

Louis Couperus Louis Marie-Anne Couperus (10 June 1863 – 16 July 1923) was a Dutch novelist and poet. His oeuvre contains a wide variety of genres: lyric poetry, psychological fiction, psychological and historical fiction, historical novels, novellas, short ...

* ''Lentesymfonie'' (1906) * ''Pallieter'' (1921), symphonic poem * ''Benedictus Deus'' (1926) for mixed choir * ''Tijl Uilenspiegel'' (1927), symphonic poem * ''James Ensor-suite'' (1931), considered his masterpiece * ''Salome's dans van de zeven sluiers'' (Salome's dance of the seven veils) * ''Shylock'', opera in three acts (1910-1913)

Sources

Flor Alpaerts
at CeBeDeM

External links

Koninklijk Conservatorium Brussel
now houses most works and manuscripts of Alpaerts, after the bankruptcy of CeBeDeM in 2015. *
Biography of Flor Alpaerts on SVM
1876 births 1954 deaths 19th-century Belgian classical composers 19th-century Belgian male musicians 20th-century Belgian classical composers 20th-century Belgian male musicians Belgian male classical composers Flemish composers Musicians from Antwerp {{Belgium-composer-stub