Joseph Ryelandt
Encyclopedia
Joseph Ryelandt was a Belgian
classical composer
.
, into a wealthy bourgeois family, for whom culture, tradition, and the Roman Catholic religion mattered. So did music, which the family practiced a lot. From his childhood on Joseph had lessons in music, which he studied assiduously, up to 2½ hours per day.
Even as an adolescent Joseph realized that his real destiny was music. But at the insistence of his mother, he first went to college, to study philosophy and later law—his father, who had died when Joseph was only seven, had been a lawyer. While at university, however, he continued his musical activities, including composition, although he had had only a few lessons in harmony. Eventually he persuaded his mother to let him show some of his compositions to Edgar Tinel
, at the time one of Belgium’s most esteemed musicians. Tinel had never taken on private students (nor would he ever again), “but,” he wrote, “I let myself be conquered because this young man will one day be someone. He played me a sonata of his. I was stupified. He already is someone, but he has never studied. This fellow has written sonatas, trios, variations, duos …” His mother relented, and from 1891 to 1895 Joseph studied with Tinel.
After his study with Tinel, he was able to devote himself exclusively to composing, being of independent financial means. The years between 1895 and 1924 were his most productive.
But World War I badly affected his financial situation, and he had a family to take care of, for in 1899 he had married Marguerite Carton de Wiart (1872–1939), and the children had come thick and fast, eight in all. He felt compelled to find a position, and in 1924 he was appointed director of the Municipal Conservatory of Bruges, a function that came with a teaching load. He assumed it with some reluctance, but he discovered that he enjoyed teaching, even “regret[ting] that I didn’t enter the teaching profession until I was 54.” He kept on composing, albeit at a slower rate. Also, he ceased composing oratorios, which he considered his major works, but that was at least as much due to the death of Charles Martens (1866–1921), his librettist as well as his Maecenas, the tireless propagandist of his music and above all his friend, whose name he never mentioned without preceding it with “my good friend” or similar expression.
His life was busy: he took on a counterpoint course at the Ghent Conservatory, he organized a highly successful concert series in his own conservatory, he was involved in the organization of the Queen Elisabeth Music Competition
, etc. Many honors came his way. He was asked to compose the Te Deum
for the centenary of the independence of Belgium
; he was made a member of the Belgian Academy in 1937 and a baron
in 1938. But his private life was saddened by the slow decline in health of his wife, who died in 1939.
World War II and the miseries and worries it entailed caused his composition to slow down still further: he wrote nothing at all in 1940– 42, and only a few chamber music works between 1943 and 1948, when he ceased composing altogether. In 1943 the German administration forced Ryelandt to resign, but he was reinstated after the liberation of Belgium in 1944. In 1945 he retired. He devoted his retirement to literature, writing poetry (including a number of translations into French of his favorite Dutch-language poet Guido Gezelle
) and reading classics, many with strong religious contents: the Bible
, the complete works of Shakespeare
, Joost van den Vondel
and Paul Claudel
, as well as Dante
, Pascal
, and Teresa of Ávila
. He died aged 95, in his beloved Bruges and “without bothering anyone,” as he had wished, after a brief illness.
Another noticeable characteristic of Ryelandt was his modesty. Although he enjoyed hearing his works performed, he left it to others—especially his teacher Tinel and Charles Lamy (pen name of Charles Martens, meaning ‘Charles, the friend [of Ryelandt]’)—to make his works known. As he put it: “If God wants my work to be known one day, that will happen. If not, what does it matter? The task of the artist is to create, and that’s it. Success is a luxury and a pleasure, it’s not indispensable.” He never bragged about the extra-musical honors that befell him. Sometimes he gently mocked them, like when, on being made Commander in the order of Leopold
, he “complained” no one had told him whom to command. When he was very old, he told his daughter: “You must never call a priest or a doctor for me at night, not before 6 in the morning. Those folk need their sleep.”
But he was not a dour man: he was sociable and had a sense of humor, from when he was a child—his mother mentions the occasional “crazy gaiety” of the young Joseph—until his old age, when he wrote a ditty in which the moon (la lune, feminine in French) scolds the indelicacy of the scientists trying to take pictures of her derrière (meaning both ‘far side’ and ‘backside’).
Finally, he had an independent streak: he was very much his own man. This appears most clearly in his ideas about music.
He considered it the task of the artist to create beauty. How the artist did this did not really matter. But originality was no virtue; personality was. Great music, like Beethoven’s
, is admired because the composer’s personality shines through; Beethoven’s daring originality is now only of historical interest. However, Ryelandt was highly critical of atonality
, claiming that the modernists’ “empty game of sound combinations brings us no interior enrichment at all,” and that the value of works like Honegger’s
“unforgettable” Jeanne d'Arc au bûcher
lay chiefly in their tonal passages.
Ryelandt held that in essence music was “a language sui generis which expresses a subconscious state of the soul: it begins where ordinary language stops.” The beauty the artist must create “calls upon sensibility as much as upon intelligence, and, in the domain of music, mainly upon sensibility, without however excluding intelligence.”
Although Ryelandt wrote a great deal of vocal music, his ideal was absolute music
. But there was an ideal beyond that. For Ryelandt, music was a religious vocation. The following words from the preface to his Notices sur mes oeuvres sum up what really mattered to him: “I think … I can say that I have not been a useless servant of art. I have done what I could. The future will decide if anything of this work will survive me to the greater glory of God.”
. The loss of these works, however, is more than compensated for by works without opus numbers.
Easily accessible complete work lists can be found here and here; the one in Willem is also very informative.
The following lists only works mentioned in Ryelandt’s own Notices—their titles being given in Ryelandt’s spelling there—and is not meant to be complete.
, which were all performed in Belgium, and some also in The Netherlands, France, and Canada.
A true, full-fledged oratorio that he wrote but destroyed deserves explicit mention, De XIV stonden, literally ‘The fourteen hours’, meaning the fourteen Stations of the Cross
, because it was set to a text written for the purpose by Guido Gezelle. Yet Ryelandt was unhappy with Gezelle’s libretto, for Gezelle, "like many men of letters, understood nothing of music, even though he sometimes put a lot of it in his verse."
Ryelandt also wrote five masses, but destroyed the first. The four that remain are:
His religious vocal music further comprises seven cantata
s, a Te Deum
, a number of short motets, and two theatrical works, the mystery play
La Parabole des Vierges ‘The Parable of the Virgins’ and the "musical drama" Sainte Cécile.
but destroyed his first. In his day the remaining five were less successful than his oratorios (though they were all performed), but four of them are now available on CD. Ryelandt likewise destroyed the first of his overtures, Caïn, his opus 3. Three remain, as well as his one symphonic poem
, Gethsemani, three orchestral preludes
and a short orchestral suite
.
— and two sonatines, six nocturnes, two volumes of preludes, three suites, etc.
The piano is also prominent in a number of chamber music
works: seven sonatas for violin and piano, three for cello and piano, and one each for horn, oboe and clarinet plus piano, as well as two piano quintets and a piano trio. Ryelandt also composed four string quartets.
Ryelandt was a major composer of art songs, some 65 in all, to texts in French and Dutch (and one in Spanish, but that Saint John of the Cross’s
Noche oscura). Most of the Dutch texts he set were by Guido Gezelle, who, notwithstanding their failed collaboration on the De XIV stonden oratorio, greatly inspired him. They are his best-known songs; it has even been claimed that they have acquired an international reputation, in spite of their Dutch texts.
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...
classical composer
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
.
Life
Joseph Victor Marie Ryelandt was born in BrugesBruges
Bruges is the capital and largest city of the province of West Flanders in the Flemish Region of Belgium. It is located in the northwest of the country....
, into a wealthy bourgeois family, for whom culture, tradition, and the Roman Catholic religion mattered. So did music, which the family practiced a lot. From his childhood on Joseph had lessons in music, which he studied assiduously, up to 2½ hours per day.
Even as an adolescent Joseph realized that his real destiny was music. But at the insistence of his mother, he first went to college, to study philosophy and later law—his father, who had died when Joseph was only seven, had been a lawyer. While at university, however, he continued his musical activities, including composition, although he had had only a few lessons in harmony. Eventually he persuaded his mother to let him show some of his compositions to Edgar Tinel
Edgar Tinel
Edgar Tinel was a Belgian composer and pianist.He was born in Sinaai, today part of Sint-Niklaas in East Flanders, Belgium, and died in Brussels. After studies at the Brussels Conservatory with Louis Brassin and François-Auguste Gevaert , he began a career as a virtuoso, but soon abandoned this...
, at the time one of Belgium’s most esteemed musicians. Tinel had never taken on private students (nor would he ever again), “but,” he wrote, “I let myself be conquered because this young man will one day be someone. He played me a sonata of his. I was stupified. He already is someone, but he has never studied. This fellow has written sonatas, trios, variations, duos …” His mother relented, and from 1891 to 1895 Joseph studied with Tinel.
After his study with Tinel, he was able to devote himself exclusively to composing, being of independent financial means. The years between 1895 and 1924 were his most productive.
But World War I badly affected his financial situation, and he had a family to take care of, for in 1899 he had married Marguerite Carton de Wiart (1872–1939), and the children had come thick and fast, eight in all. He felt compelled to find a position, and in 1924 he was appointed director of the Municipal Conservatory of Bruges, a function that came with a teaching load. He assumed it with some reluctance, but he discovered that he enjoyed teaching, even “regret[ting] that I didn’t enter the teaching profession until I was 54.” He kept on composing, albeit at a slower rate. Also, he ceased composing oratorios, which he considered his major works, but that was at least as much due to the death of Charles Martens (1866–1921), his librettist as well as his Maecenas, the tireless propagandist of his music and above all his friend, whose name he never mentioned without preceding it with “my good friend” or similar expression.
His life was busy: he took on a counterpoint course at the Ghent Conservatory, he organized a highly successful concert series in his own conservatory, he was involved in the organization of the Queen Elisabeth Music Competition
Queen Elisabeth Music Competition
The Queen Elisabeth Music Competition, a founding member of the World Federation of International Music Competitions has been, since its foundation, considered the world over to be one of the most prestigious and most difficult. It is devoted to violin , piano , to composition and to singing...
, etc. Many honors came his way. He was asked to compose the Te Deum
Te Deum
The Te Deum is an early Christian hymn of praise. The title is taken from its opening Latin words, Te Deum laudamus, rendered literally as "Thee, O God, we praise"....
for the centenary of the independence of Belgium
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...
; he was made a member of the Belgian Academy in 1937 and a baron
Baron
Baron is a title of nobility. The word baron comes from Old French baron, itself from Old High German and Latin baro meaning " man, warrior"; it merged with cognate Old English beorn meaning "nobleman"...
in 1938. But his private life was saddened by the slow decline in health of his wife, who died in 1939.
World War II and the miseries and worries it entailed caused his composition to slow down still further: he wrote nothing at all in 1940– 42, and only a few chamber music works between 1943 and 1948, when he ceased composing altogether. In 1943 the German administration forced Ryelandt to resign, but he was reinstated after the liberation of Belgium in 1944. In 1945 he retired. He devoted his retirement to literature, writing poetry (including a number of translations into French of his favorite Dutch-language poet Guido Gezelle
Guido Gezelle
Guido Pieter Theodorus Josephus Gezelle was an influential Flemish language writer and poet and a Roman Catholic priest from Belgium.- Life :...
) and reading classics, many with strong religious contents: the Bible
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
, the complete works of Shakespeare
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...
, Joost van den Vondel
Joost van den Vondel
Joost van den Vondel was a Dutch writer and playwright. He is considered the most prominent Dutch poet and playwright of the 17th century. His plays are the ones from that period that are still most frequently performed, and his epic Joannes de Boetgezant , on the life of John the Baptist, has...
and Paul Claudel
Paul Claudel
Paul Claudel was a French poet, dramatist and diplomat, and the younger brother of the sculptor Camille Claudel. He was most famous for his verse dramas, which often convey his devout Catholicism.-Life:...
, as well as Dante
Dante Alighieri
Durante degli Alighieri, mononymously referred to as Dante , was an Italian poet, prose writer, literary theorist, moral philosopher, and political thinker. He is best known for the monumental epic poem La commedia, later named La divina commedia ...
, Pascal
Blaise Pascal
Blaise Pascal , was a French mathematician, physicist, inventor, writer and Catholic philosopher. He was a child prodigy who was educated by his father, a tax collector in Rouen...
, and Teresa of Ávila
Teresa of Ávila
Saint Teresa of Ávila, also called Saint Teresa of Jesus, baptized as Teresa Sánchez de Cepeda y Ahumada, was a prominent Spanish mystic, Roman Catholic saint, Carmelite nun, and writer of the Counter Reformation, and theologian of contemplative life through mental prayer...
. He died aged 95, in his beloved Bruges and “without bothering anyone,” as he had wished, after a brief illness.
Character
From his writings and the testimony of all who knew him, Ryelandt appears first and foremost as a man with a great sense of duty. Duty towards God above all: he was a deeply religious man, who tried to go to mass every day, who was knowledgeable about his religion, and who conceived of his music making as a religious duty. Duty towards his music: he was privileged in being able to devote himself exclusively to music, but he was highly conscious this was a privilege and worked very hard, both as a student of Tinel (who drove him hard) and as a composer. Towards his family: he was always extremely solicitous of his wife, but especially during her illness, when he would organize serenades for her as she could no longer attend concerts; he made time for his children, considering their education extremely important, and encouraging them; and he was “Bon-Papa Musique” for his grandchildren, for whom he played his Scènes Enfantines. Towards his students, whose work he corrected with respect instead of denigrating it, and who greatly appreciated his teaching qualities: “Even though he followed the classical method of teaching harmony and counterpoint …, you never had the impression that you were learning something boring,” wrote one of them.Another noticeable characteristic of Ryelandt was his modesty. Although he enjoyed hearing his works performed, he left it to others—especially his teacher Tinel and Charles Lamy (pen name of Charles Martens, meaning ‘Charles, the friend [of Ryelandt]’)—to make his works known. As he put it: “If God wants my work to be known one day, that will happen. If not, what does it matter? The task of the artist is to create, and that’s it. Success is a luxury and a pleasure, it’s not indispensable.” He never bragged about the extra-musical honors that befell him. Sometimes he gently mocked them, like when, on being made Commander in the order of Leopold
Leopold I of Belgium
Leopold I was from 21 July 1831 the first King of the Belgians, following Belgium's independence from the Netherlands. He was the founder of the Belgian line of the House of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha...
, he “complained” no one had told him whom to command. When he was very old, he told his daughter: “You must never call a priest or a doctor for me at night, not before 6 in the morning. Those folk need their sleep.”
But he was not a dour man: he was sociable and had a sense of humor, from when he was a child—his mother mentions the occasional “crazy gaiety” of the young Joseph—until his old age, when he wrote a ditty in which the moon (la lune, feminine in French) scolds the indelicacy of the scientists trying to take pictures of her derrière (meaning both ‘far side’ and ‘backside’).
Finally, he had an independent streak: he was very much his own man. This appears most clearly in his ideas about music.
Ideas about music
Even as a young boy, Ryelandt had a mind of his own. Much as he revered his “best piano teacher,” Franz Devos (of the Ghent Conservatory) who gave him private lessons, he wrote that Devos “did not pay enough attention to technique, which left me unsatisfied.” While he learned a lot from Tinel, whose technical mastery he greatly admired, he also let himself be influenced by Wagner, whom Tinel detested, and by French composers such as Franck, Fauré and Debussy, whereas Tinel was primarily German oriented. But Ryelandt never belonged to any school or fashion; in fact, he despised fashion.He considered it the task of the artist to create beauty. How the artist did this did not really matter. But originality was no virtue; personality was. Great music, like Beethoven’s
Ludwig van Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven was a German composer and pianist. A crucial figure in the transition between the Classical and Romantic eras in Western art music, he remains one of the most famous and influential composers of all time.Born in Bonn, then the capital of the Electorate of Cologne and part of...
, is admired because the composer’s personality shines through; Beethoven’s daring originality is now only of historical interest. However, Ryelandt was highly critical of atonality
Atonality
Atonality in its broadest sense describes music that lacks a tonal center, or key. Atonality in this sense usually describes compositions written from about 1908 to the present day where a hierarchy of pitches focusing on a single, central tone is not used, and the notes of the chromatic scale...
, claiming that the modernists’ “empty game of sound combinations brings us no interior enrichment at all,” and that the value of works like Honegger’s
Arthur Honegger
Arthur Honegger was a Swiss composer, who was born in France and lived a large part of his life in Paris. He was a member of Les six. His most frequently performed work is probably the orchestral work Pacific 231, which is interpreted as imitating the sound of a steam locomotive.-Biography:Born...
“unforgettable” Jeanne d'Arc au bûcher
Jeanne d'Arc au bûcher
Jeanne d'Arc au bûcher is an oratorio by Arthur Honegger, originally commissioned by Ida Rubinstein. The drama takes place during the heroine's trial and execution, with flashbacks to her younger days...
lay chiefly in their tonal passages.
Ryelandt held that in essence music was “a language sui generis which expresses a subconscious state of the soul: it begins where ordinary language stops.” The beauty the artist must create “calls upon sensibility as much as upon intelligence, and, in the domain of music, mainly upon sensibility, without however excluding intelligence.”
Although Ryelandt wrote a great deal of vocal music, his ideal was absolute music
Absolute music
Absolute music is a concept in music that describes music as an art form separated from formalisms or other considerations; it is not explicitly about anything; it is non-representational. In contrast to program music, absolute music makes sense without accompanying words, images, drama, or...
. But there was an ideal beyond that. For Ryelandt, music was a religious vocation. The following words from the preface to his Notices sur mes oeuvres sum up what really mattered to him: “I think … I can say that I have not been a useless servant of art. I have done what I could. The future will decide if anything of this work will survive me to the greater glory of God.”
Works
Ryelandt’s output is greater than his last opus number, 133, or rather than the sum total of the 117 opus numbers he did not repudiate, would suggest. Ryelandt destroyed not only unpublished works, but even published ones, some by a prestigious house like Breitkopf & HärtelBreitkopf & Härtel
Breitkopf & Härtel is the world's oldest music publishing house. The firm was founded in 1719 in Leipzig by Bernhard Christoph Breitkopf . The catalogue currently contains over 1000 composers, 8000 works and 15,000 music editions or books on music. The name "Härtel" was added when Gottfried...
. The loss of these works, however, is more than compensated for by works without opus numbers.
Easily accessible complete work lists can be found here and here; the one in Willem is also very informative.
The following lists only works mentioned in Ryelandt’s own Notices—their titles being given in Ryelandt’s spelling there—and is not meant to be complete.
Religious vocal music
Ryelandt’s national and international reputation was made primarily by his five great oratoriosOratórios
Oratórios is a Brazilian municipality located in the state of Minas Gerais. The city belongs to the mesoregion of Zona da Mata and to the microregion of Ponte Nova.-See also:* List of municipalities in Minas Gerais...
, which were all performed in Belgium, and some also in The Netherlands, France, and Canada.
- Purgatorium, op. 39 (mostly composed in 1904), for soprano, choir and orchestra; text: a selection of Latin PsalmPsalmsThe Book of Psalms , commonly referred to simply as Psalms, is a book of the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Bible...
texts, made by Ryelandt himself. - De Komst des Heeren (The Coming of the Lord), op. 45 (1906), an oratorio for AdventAdventAdvent is a season observed in many Western Christian churches, a time of expectant waiting and preparation for the celebration of the Nativity of Jesus at Christmas. It is the beginning of the Western liturgical year and commences on Advent Sunday, called Levavi...
, for four soloists, double choir and orchestra; text: a selection of Dutch-language Bible texts, made by Charles Martens and Ryelandt. - Maria, op. 48 (1909), for four soloists, choir and orchestra; text by Charles Martens and Leo Goemans.
- Agnus Dei (Lamb of God), op. 56 (1913–1914), oratorio for several soloists, choir and orchestra; text originally in German, by Benedicta von Spiegel.
- Christus Rex (Christ the King), op. 79 (1922), for soloists, choir and orchestra; text by Charles Martens. Ryelandt later dedicated this work, which he considered his masterpiece, to Pope Pius XIPope Pius XIPope Pius XI , born Ambrogio Damiano Achille Ratti, was Pope from 6 February 1922, and sovereign of Vatican City from its creation as an independent state on 11 February 1929 until his death on 10 February 1939...
, who established the Feast of Christ the KingFeast of Christ the KingThe Feast of Christ the King is the last holy Sunday in the western liturgical calendar, celebrated by the Roman Catholic Church as well as many Anglicans, Lutherans, and other Mainline Protestants.-Origin and history in the Catholic Church:Pope Pius XI instituted the Feast of Christ the...
in 1925.
A true, full-fledged oratorio that he wrote but destroyed deserves explicit mention, De XIV stonden, literally ‘The fourteen hours’, meaning the fourteen Stations of the Cross
Stations of the Cross
Stations of the Cross refers to the depiction of the final hours of Jesus, and the devotion commemorating the Passion. The tradition as chapel devotion began with St...
, because it was set to a text written for the purpose by Guido Gezelle. Yet Ryelandt was unhappy with Gezelle’s libretto, for Gezelle, "like many men of letters, understood nothing of music, even though he sometimes put a lot of it in his verse."
Ryelandt also wrote five masses, but destroyed the first. The four that remain are:
- Missa, op. 72 (1918) for mixed choir a cappella.
- Missa quator vocibus cum organo o,p. 84 (1925), for four-part choir and organ, dedicated to Jules Van NuffelJules Van NuffelJules Van Nuffel , was a musicologist, composer, and a renowned expert on religious music.-Biography:...
. - Missa six vocibus, op. 111 (1934), for six-part choir a cappella.
- Missa pro defunctis, op. 127 (1939), for mixed choir a cappella, a brief Requiem massRequiemA Requiem or Requiem Mass, also known as Mass for the dead or Mass of the dead , is a Mass celebrated for the repose of the soul or souls of one or more deceased persons, using a particular form of the Roman Missal...
composed in memory of his wife.
His religious vocal music further comprises seven cantata
Cantata
A cantata is a vocal composition with an instrumental accompaniment, typically in several movements, often involving a choir....
s, a Te Deum
Te Deum
The Te Deum is an early Christian hymn of praise. The title is taken from its opening Latin words, Te Deum laudamus, rendered literally as "Thee, O God, we praise"....
, a number of short motets, and two theatrical works, the mystery play
Mystery play
Mystery plays and miracle plays are among the earliest formally developed plays in medieval Europe. Medieval mystery plays focused on the representation of Bible stories in churches as tableaux with accompanying antiphonal song...
La Parabole des Vierges ‘The Parable of the Virgins’ and the "musical drama" Sainte Cécile.
Symphonic music
Ryelandt wrote six symphoniesSymfony
Symfony is a web application framework written in PHP which follows the model-view-controller paradigm. Released under the MIT license, Symfony is free software...
but destroyed his first. In his day the remaining five were less successful than his oratorios (though they were all performed), but four of them are now available on CD. Ryelandt likewise destroyed the first of his overtures, Caïn, his opus 3. Three remain, as well as his one symphonic poem
Symphonic poem
A symphonic poem or tone poem is a piece of orchestral music in a single continuous section in which the content of a poem, a story or novel, a painting, a landscape or another source is illustrated or evoked. The term was first applied by Hungarian composer Franz Liszt to his 13 works in this vein...
, Gethsemani, three orchestral preludes
Prelude (music)
A prelude is a short piece of music, the form of which may vary from piece to piece. The prelude can be thought of as a preface. It may stand on its own or introduce another work...
and a short orchestral suite
Suite
In music, a suite is an ordered set of instrumental or orchestral pieces normally performed in a concert setting rather than as accompaniment; they may be extracts from an opera, ballet , or incidental music to a play or film , or they may be entirely original movements .In the...
.
Other
Ryelandt trained as a pianist until he was about 20; no wonder his piano output is vast. Froyen lists about forty compositions, including 12 piano sonatas—the fourth dedicated to Vincent d'IndyVincent d'Indy
Vincent d'Indy was a French composer and teacher.-Life:Paul Marie Théodore Vincent d'Indy was born in Paris into an aristocratic family of royalist and Catholic persuasion. He had piano lessons from an early age from his paternal grandmother, who passed him on to Antoine François Marmontel and...
— and two sonatines, six nocturnes, two volumes of preludes, three suites, etc.
The piano is also prominent in a number of chamber music
Chamber music
Chamber music is a form of classical music, written for a small group of instruments which traditionally could be accommodated in a palace chamber. Most broadly, it includes any art music that is performed by a small number of performers with one performer to a part...
works: seven sonatas for violin and piano, three for cello and piano, and one each for horn, oboe and clarinet plus piano, as well as two piano quintets and a piano trio. Ryelandt also composed four string quartets.
Ryelandt was a major composer of art songs, some 65 in all, to texts in French and Dutch (and one in Spanish, but that Saint John of the Cross’s
John of the Cross
John of the Cross , born Juan de Yepes Álvarez, was a major figure of the Counter-Reformation, a Spanish mystic, Catholic saint, Carmelite friar and priest, born at Fontiveros, Old Castile....
Noche oscura). Most of the Dutch texts he set were by Guido Gezelle, who, notwithstanding their failed collaboration on the De XIV stonden oratorio, greatly inspired him. They are his best-known songs; it has even been claimed that they have acquired an international reputation, in spite of their Dutch texts.
Discography
Discographies in Meuris, pp. 71–73 and here.Trivia
- Whilst still alive, Ryelandt had a street named after him, the Baron Joseph Ryelandtstraat, in Bruges. Bruges also named the Joseph Ryelandtzaal after him, a late baroque church (1681–1684) converted into a 200-seat concert hall in the 1980s.
- The Municipal Conservatory of Bruges possesses a painting of Ryelandt by Jef van de Fackere (1879–1946).
- Ryelandt, “a Flemish artist”? Although Ryelandt wrote in French, the language of high school and college instruction at the time in all of Belgium, his native language was Dutch. As he held music to be a language sui generis, as his vocal music is set to texts in a variety of languages, and as he encouraged performances in translations, it is clear he aspired to be an international artist. Yet his reputation as a Flemish artist, which he has always had, is not undeserved. In his day it was unfashionable to consider Dutch a language on a par with, say, French or German. Ryelandt did consider it so (he disapproved of francophones who despised Dutch), and treated it so, in his compositions. And in a sense he acknowledged he was a Flemish artist, by accepting a representative function in the Christelijk Vlaams Kunstenaarsverbond ‘Christian Flemish Artists’ Organization’, besides Constant PermekeConstant PermekeConstant Permeke was a Belgian painter and sculptor who is considered the leading figure of Flemish expressionism.Permeke was born in Antwerp but when he was six years old the family moved to Ostend, where his father became curator of the Municipal Museum of Arts. Permeke went to school in Bruges...
and Stijn StreuvelsStijn StreuvelsStijn Streuvels, born Franciscus Petrus Maria Lateur, is a Flemish writer. He was born on 3 October 1871 in Heule, Kortrijk, and died in Ingooigem, Anzegem on 15 August 1969 at the age of 98. In 1905 he married Alida Staelens. They had 4 children: Paula , Paul , Dina and Isa...
.
External links
- Ryelandt Piano Quintet in A minor in PDF Score and Incomplete Parts Scanned at Sibley Library URResearch (his op. 32)