Van Eeckhout, Ernest-Bernardin

Annelies Focquaert (translation: Jo Sneppe)

As son of the Mechelen sculptor Jan Van Eeckhout he grew up in an artistic family. At the Municipal Conservatory of his native town he followed classes in solfège and flute, playing along in the school orchestra conducted by director August De Boeck. At age twelve he learned to play the organ, which enabled him from time to time to replace the organist of Our- Lady-over-the-Dijle church. At age fifteen he founded a small wind and percussion orchestra named Aulodia, conducting it at concerts in cultural and sporting circles in and around Mechelen.

During his secondary 'grammar school' studies at St Rombouts' school he was, together with his brothers, part of the famous choir conducted by Van Nuffel, there and then acquiring his taste for Gregorian chant and early music. As a result of this interest he took up teaching Gregorian plainsong in the secondary school of the Benedictine St Andrew's abbey in Zevenkerken near Bruges from October 1927 to September 1932. He was also admitted into abbey life, wearing the Benedictine habit, without ever taking the monastic vows though.

Between 1932 and 1938 he took lessons of harmony, counterpoint and fugue, at the Conservatory of Brussels from Raymond Moulaert, Fernand Quinet and Jean Absil, and with the organist Charles Hens also private tutoring for organ. In 1939 he earned a second prize in counterpoint at the Conservatory of Brussels in the class of Moulaert.

From 1932 on - and this until his death - Van Eeckhout was organist at the parish of the Holy Family in St Lambrechts-Woluwe, where in 1934 he also founded a choir. For the period of the World Exhibition of 1935 in Brussels (May-November), he was organist and Kapellmeister of St Paul's church in the Pavilion of Catholic Life, commissioned to steer musical life there in the right direction and to organize a weekly Saturday night concert. Alfons Desmedt was one of the performers on the Delmotte organ, as well as Staf Nees on the carillon. Van Eeckhout also played the organ in several other churches in the Brussels region, such as the Notre-Dame du Sacré-Cœur in Etterbeek (1934>1942) and the Basilica of Koekelberg (1943>1945). In addition to his commitments as organist and choirmaster, Van Eeckhout taught music classes from the late 1950s onwards at the girls' schools of the 'Institut de l'Enfant-Jésus' in Etterbeek and the 'Institut des Dames-de-Marie' in Uccle.

After the war he regularly conducted jubilee concerts of catholic trade union associations such as the KAV (Catholic Women Workers Guild), ACW (General Christian Workers), KAJ (Catholic Young Workers) and their respective Walloon equivalents. In 1950 Van Eeckhout became Kapellmeister of the reinstated 'Chapelle de Bourgondie', an ensemble for early music that was based on the activities of the former court orchestra of Philip the Good in Brussels. For his research as to historically informed music practice Van Eeckhout collaborated with the Italian musicologist Antonio Tirabassi. When in 1954 the ensemble ceased to exist Van Eeckhout founded the Chamber Orchestra of Sint-Lambrechts-Woluwe, which he led as conductor for ten years.

As a composer he wrote some hundred works: songs, chamber music and music for chamber orchestra, but above all plenty of sacred music (Masses, motets, Requiem, Te Deum). His Nieuw-Liturgische mis (New-Liturgical Mass) from 1965, in Gregorian style and in the Dutch language, was partly incorporated in the hymnbook Zingt Jubilate (Sing Jubilate) and recorded by the White Canons of Tongerlo. Furthermore he also composed stage music for Athalie by Racine and for the mystery play Marie la Misérable / Lenneke Mare, performed in Sint-Lambrechts-Woluwe in 1952, 1954 and 1969. Between 1957 and 1965 he wrote the soundtrack for at least ten documentaries and for the movie Vive le Duc, entirely filmed in and around Sint-Lambrechts-Woluwe. As visual artist he participated in a number of exhibitions, with paintings, drawings and sculptures which often testify of a musical inspiration (for example in Brussels, 1943 and Mechelen, 1961).

Van Eeckhout's widow donated his legacy to the Library of the Brussels Conservatory.