Description
Clarinettist Eddy Vanoosthuyse has long asked himself why Flemish and Belgian composers are absent from the international clarinet repertoire. This recording is part of his answer and the result of years of searching through archives, libraries and manuscripts. With the Brussels Philharmonic under conductor Dirk Vermeulen, he presents five works by Karel Lodewijk Hanssens (1802-1871), a Ghent-born composer whose manuscripts are held at the Royal Conservatory of Ghent, the school where Vanoosthuyse completed his studies and has been teaching for over 30 years. Hanssens composed these works between 1836 and 1843 which have echoes of Beethoven and Weber for specific soloists in his immediate circle; the programme offers two double concertos that combine the clarinet with unusual partners. The Fantaisie pairs clarinet with a scordatura violin -- the strings tuned a semitone higher to allow the violinist to play in a more resonant key -- performed here with Mikhail Bezverkhny, first prize winner of the Queen Elisabeth Competition and a former colleague of Vanoosthuyse at the Ghent Conservatory. The Morceau de concert places clarinet alongside oboe, with Joris Van den Hauwe, principal oboe of the Brussels Philharmonic, as partner. Vanoosthuyse was principal clarinet of the Brussels Philharmonic for 35 years and of the Flemish Opera before that.
