Familiar with our free lectures? These interesting and informative presentations place our musical events in a broader cultural context in order to make them even more accessible to all our audiences. In particular, they allow you to learn more about Mozart-era heritage sites in Brussels, which are often little known or even neglected. In addition, they help us unite all the cultural actors present on Place des Martyrs around the same initiative. In collaboration with the Maison CFC team, we are once again pleased to offer you two highly pertinent lectures. www.maisoncfc.be
wednesday 23.06 "BRUXELLES 1791"
What was the year 1791 to hold for Brussels, the capital of the Southern Netherlands, once again governed by the Austrian Habsburgs following the episode of the Brabant Revolution? This lecture (in French) will highlight noteworthy political and cultural events in the course of the year, including the investiture on 30 June of Emperor Leopold II as Duke of Brabant, a ceremony steeped in significance in a context troubled by revolutionary echoes.
Michèle Galandis a full professor in the Faculty of Philosophy and Social Sciences at the Université libre de Bruxelles, where she teaches modern history, the history of the ancient Netherlands as well as the initiation to the sources of this period. Her doctoral thesis resulted in a monograph entitled Charles de Lorraine, Governor General of the Austrian Netherlands (1744-1780), Brussels, 1993 (Études sur le XVIIIe siècle, XX). She also edited this prince's authoritative diary. Her publications focus mainly on the political and institutional history of the former Netherlands and the relationship between Brussels and Vienna in the 18th century, as well as on the social and cultural repercussions of the presence of the governmental institutions in Brussels under the Ancien Régime.
friday 25.06 "COMMENT MOZART DEVINT LE DIVIN MOZART"
To our modern ears, La clemenza di Tito, Mozart's final opera, is an anomaly. At worst, it is a regression from the composer’s other masterpieces of 1791 (the Clarinet Concerto, The Magic Flute, the Requiem). At best, it is a further proof of Mozart's genius, his free spirit, his abiltiy to express the noblest ideas and the deepest feelings, to surmount the daunting challenges of a highly codified genre of opera seria combined with an urgent commission. However, it was by no means from the latter Romantic perspective that La clemenza di Tito was critiqued and received at its premiere. What has happened since? The very way we listen to music and judge composers has changed as a result of revolutionary events, of social, economic and institutional changes, of debates about the musical ideas and works of later generations. This lecture (in French) proposes to trace this evolution from the early days of the Revolution up to 1830, when those more Romantic ways of judging the divine Mozart (which remain ours today) first became established.
Hugo Rodriguez holds a master's degree in musicology as well as a master's degree in French and Romance languages and literature. He works in the music section of the Royal Library of Belgium (KBR). His research lies at the crossroads of the classical humanities and cognitive sciences. He is currently pursuing a doctoral thesis on the theoretical issues raised by the relationship between creation and communication in music, based on the case of Franz Liszt's programme music.