Verbesselt, August

Annelies Focquaert (translation: Jo Sneppe)

August Verbesselt was born in Klein-Willebroek in 1919. Initially he took piano lessons from the composer Jozef Schampaert, but at age 11 he became a member of the local wind and percussion band, where he started playing the flute. Later he took flute lessons at the Willebroek music school until he went to the 'atheneum' (non-denominational grammar school) in Antwerp. For the youth band meanwhile Verbesselt composed his first works, which he later destroyed, however.

At age 18 he went to the Conservatory of Antwerp, taking flute lessons from Louis Stoefs, who encouraged his interest for contemporary music. In addition he also studied counterpoint and fugue with Karel Candael and Renier Van der Velden. As he felt the classes at the conservatory 'didn't progress fast enough', he also took an intensive private course of harmony with the pianist and organist Lode Ontrop for four years. In 1942 he obtained the higher degree for flute, being the first student to earn a higher degree of that kind, and with a composition of his own, to boot. Also for his own exams of chamber music he composed several works as well.

Upon graduation in 1942 he became first flautist of the orchestra of the Flemish Opera in Antwerp, where he was employed until 1980. He was also at large engaged in the field of education: from 1953 to 1959 he was teacher of flute-playing at the music academy of Boom, in 1955 he became assistant teacher of harmony at the Conservatory of Antwerp and one year later he was appointed director of the music school in Niel. In 1964 he functioned as a temporary teacher of transposition in the Antwerp Conservatory, and this was followed by his appointment three years later as the first titular of the new course of Musical Analysis and Theory of Musical Forms, even before a structured composition course or a theoretical department had come up. The list of his former students includes composers such as Janpieter Biesemans, Alain Craens, Wilfried Westerlinck and Raoul De Smet.

August Verbesselt wrote a very diversified oeuvre. His training as a flute-player incited him to write several works for his own instrument, his Concerto for flute, percussion and orchestra (1952) acquiring a worldwide reputation, for one thanks to the flautist Jean-Pierre Rampal. But in the list of his compositions the other members of the winds family are amply represented as well. As such he wrote concertos for oboe and clarinet and a concerto for clarinet quartet and chamber orchestra. Also a duo of clarinet quartets (1985) and woodwind quintets (1994) show his love of woodwinds chamber music.

As to his composition style Verbesselt's oeuvre may be divided into two well-defined periods. In a first period (1940-1967) he mainly wrote in an atonal but free style that yet remained faithful to classical structures such as the sonata or lied form, marked by an extremely dynamic rhythmicality. His best-known works from that period are the above-mentioned Concerto for flute, his Ballad (1956) and his Concerto for Orchestra (1959).

In a second period (1967-1995) he made use of dodecaphonic series as base material for his compositions. As a matter of fact August Verbesselt had fallen under the spell of the twelve-tone system after an educational visit to the Dutch foundation Gaudeamus, where he stayed together with colleagues such as Jacqueline Fontyn, Karel Goeyvaerts, Peter Welffens and Renier Van der Velden. Henceforth dodecaphonics became his overall frame of mind for the rest of his career as a composer.

Verbesselt always composed with his audience at the back of his mind an so he wrote dodecaphonic works based on series that sounded virtually 'tonal'. Thus in his twelve-tone series he didn't seek out contrasts, but rather the harmonic and melodic recognizability. In his own words: “I simply used the dodecaphonic system just like others employed the tonal system, with a view to writing music the sense of which can be understood by as many people as possible.” In his first dodecaphonic work, Triptiek for orchestra from 1967, Verbesselt succeeded in creating a mysterious atmosphere by combining different, often unexpected tone colors and by playing off sound groups against one another. In 1975 the orchestral work Universum followed, commissioned by the B.R.T. (Belgian Radio and Television Broadcast). In this composition Verbesselt mixed his contemporary dodecaphonic notation with the form of the symphonic poem.

Ares en Irene from 1987 again illustrates Verbesselt's talent for creating atmosphere. In this composition he makes use of a choir that vocalizes on loose vowels and sounds. Moreover in this work he inserts a four-part Bach choral. Such an intervention wasn't something new: already in 1972 Verbesselt had used early (baroque) music as a source of inspiration in Manipulaties rond een thema van Heinrich Schütz for four horns, four trumpets, four trombones, bass tuba and percussion.

August Verbesselt passed away in 2012.