The Five Archetypes of Orchestration in 60 Lessons — Part I

Dr. Swerts, Piet Jozef (b. November 14, 1960, Tongeren) is a Flemish composer, conductor, and pianist of international acclaim, with a large catalogue of hundreds of works including stage, orchestral, chamber, choral, vocal, and piano works.

Dr. Swerts studied from 1974–89 at the Leuven College of Arts (LUCA) Campus Lemmens in Leuven, where he obtained ten first prizes and, for the first time in the history of the same institute, the special Prize Lemmens Tinel for composition and piano with great distinction. Among his teachers were Alan Weiss (USA) and Robert Groslot.

Since 1982, he is Professor of Composition and Orchestration at the same institute, now the Department of Drama and Music associated with the Catholic University of Leuven. He has been invited as a guest professor in the Sweelinck Conservatory in Amsterdam, Netherlands; in the Department of Electronic Music at the University of Huddersfield, GB, the Polytechnic Institute in Castelo Branco, Portugal, as well as at the Polytechnic Institute North Karelia, Conservatory of Joensuu, Finland, and the Conservatory of Barcelona, Spain.

As a composer, he has received numerous awards, including the Baron Flor Peeters Prize (1983) for Apocalyps I and the Prize of the Belgian Artistic Promotion (1985) for the song Ardennes. He has also received the SABAM Prize (1986) for his Piano Concerto No. 2 (Rotations), which was chosen as an imposed concerto during the finals of the International Queen Elisabeth Competition later that year. His other awards include the Camille Huysmans Composition Prize (1986) for Dream Pictures and the Prize for Composition of the Province of Limburg (1986) for Capriccio. In addition, he has received the Silver Trophy of the Cultural Youth Passport Belgium-Netherlands (1988) as a promising young artist, the Prize of the Gazet van Antwerpen (newspaper) (1989) for Symphony No. 1 and the Prize for Composition of the Province Brabant (1993) for a choral work. As a composer, he considers himself autodidactic. Nevertheless, in summer 1981, he participated in a composition summer course with Witold Lutoslawski and Vladimir Kotonsky in Poland. From 1985 until 2005, he was also the conductor of the Ensemble for Contemporary Music at the Institute, and since that time, he has mostly worked on the basis of commissions. Among the commissioners are the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra of Flanders, the Symphony Orchestra of Flanders, the Opera of Antwerp, the Radio Orchestra, Eureopan Brass Band Championships, l’Orchestre de Strassbourg, the Rubio String Quartet, the Gaggini Quartet, the Flanders Recorder Quartet, the International Queen Elisabeth Competition, and many others.

In 1993, his violin concerto Zodiac was selected out of 154 works from 28 countries as the compulsory concerto for the finals of the International Queen Elisabeth Competition for Violin. For this piece, he received the Grand Prix in the International Queen Elisabeth Composition Competition, 1993 (the first Belgian composer to win the prize). Included in the jury at the competition that year were Henryk Górecki and Franco Donatoni. In the same year, a double CD of the world première performance of his Passio Domini Nostri Jesu Christi Secundum Marcum for four soloists, chorus, and large orchestra (composed in 1988–89 and first performed in 1993) was released. In 1994, the international organization Jaycies awarded him as one of the Ten Outstanding Young People.

Dr. Swerts has been invited as a guest conductor in Austria, the Czech Republic, France, the Netherlands, Poland, and China, where he conducted the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra in 1994 with his own works. In October 2005, he was guest conductor of the Simon Bilivar Symphony Orchestra in Caracas, Venezuela, where he conducted a full program of Belgian music, including his own compositions.

In December 1996–January 1997, his first opera, Les liaisons dangereuses was premièred by the Flemish Opera (who commissioned it) in Ghent and Antwerp. In the magazine Opera Now (UK), it was hailed as one of the most remarkable events of that season. In January 1997, there was a CD release by Eufoda devoted to his piano compositions (1985–95), as recorded by the composer himself.

In September 2000, his Symphony No. 2 (Morgenrot) was given its world première to unanimous critical acclaim; since then, his Clarinet Quintet, recently recorded by the Finnish Tempera String Quartet en Roeland Hendrikx, clarinet for the label In Flanders’ Fields has also been given a successful première. His fifth piano concerto Wings, performed and recorded by the composer, has already had many performances after its first year of creation: 4 performances in Germany in December 2004, 3 performances in Japan in August 2004, 6 performances in Belgium in 2003, 2 performances in Québec, Canada, in April 2005, and performances in Singapore, France, 2006, USA in December 2005. His Dance of Uzume for alto saxophone and concert band was his first commission from Japan for the famous EMI artist Nobuya Sugawa, recorded in January 2005 by the famous Tokio Kosei Wind Orchestra. His large-scale piece for choir and orchestra, Living Stone, a set of 14 pieces and 60 minutes of music to be built in an exposition with the same name and content at the Museum Site M in Leuven, from September 2005 until January 2006, has been recorded on CD. In 2006, his Kotekan for saxophone and strings was commissioned by the International Adolphe Sax Association as compulsory concerto during the finals of the competition in November 2006. He played in USA in 2005, 2007, and 2010 and gave recitals in Ethiopa and Addis Abeba.

He is currently holding a doctorate degree at the Catholic University of Leuven, where he is a professor of composition and orchestration at LUCA, Leuven University College of Arts, campus Lemmens, and is a senior researcher at the Department of Music & Drama.

In 2011, he became a Doctor of Arts with the greatest distinction at the Leuven University College of Arts with a comparative research of compositional canonic techniques in the L’homme armé Masses of the late 15th century and contemporary composers who utilized the same melody in their music.

In 2012, he composed his sixth piano concerto, ‘Indian Summer', and was also involved as a soundtrack composer in an international film project, Atlantic,' by the Dutch director Jan-Willem Van Ewijk from Amsterdam.

In 2013, he became a member of the Royal Academy of Arts of Belgium.

In 2014, Vienna Philharmonic harpist Anneleen Lenaerts played the première of his Etoiles for harp and orchestra.

In 2016, he received a commission from the National Orchestra of Belgium for a new orchestral work named 'l'Apogée' which was premiered in May 2017 conducted by American conductor Hugh Wolff..

In September 2017, his large oratorio ‘Symphony of Trees’ (86'), commissioned by the City of Ypres, was premiered as a commemoration of the First World War in the Cathedral of Ypres with Thomas Blondelle, tenor, Lee Bisset, soprano, a children’s choir, a 280-man mixed choir, two organs, and the Flemish Symphony Orchestra conducted by David Angus.

Its CD is released by PHAEDRA. On November 15th, 2017, he conducted the Ukrainian Symphony Orchestra at the Gala Concert in Kiev as closure of the Golden Saxophone Competition under the surveillance of the Belgian Embassy. Current commissions generate the first performances of Passions, a new double concerto for two pianos created in Belgium and Rotterdam in 2019, Serenata for wind ensemble, commissioned by Il Gardelino and to be recorded on CD in 2018, and a new suite, Horta for saxophone and piano, commissioned by Arno Bornkamp, presented at the World Congress in Zagreb in 2018.

In 2019, he conducted the Radio and TV orchestra in Tirana with his double concerto Passions.

In 2020, his Symphony Yakara was created by the South Netherlands Philharmony, with a baritone solo and a female choir.

In 2024, his celloconcerto Sehnsucht will be created by the National Orchestra of Belgium with Yubai Chen as soloist for the 2nd Prize QE Competition 2022.

In 2025, his new orchestral work, Le Tombeau de Josquin was commissioned by the Antwerp Symphony Orchestra and will be created on January 18th in the Elisabeth Hall.