Oscar van Hemel

A tribute to Oscar van Hemel

Muriël van Hemel

Label: Aliud
Format: CD
Barcode: 8717775551850

Catalog number: ACDOE 1412
Releasedate: 01-12-23

Modern Composer
His Grand daughter is playing the Violin on this album
Muriël van Hemel is the Grand Daughter of Oscar van Hemel.
In the Noord Nederlands Orkest, she is a regular member of the first violin group. She really enjoys this challenging job.
Muriël also founded the van Hemel Ensemble to bring her grandfather’s chamber music back into the spotlight. She is getting to know him better as a person through his music because, unfortunately, Muriël hardly got to know him in real life.

Oscar van Hemel (1892-1981) was born in Antwerp, Belgium. His father cut cardboard books for barrel organs as an arranger and had a passion for brass bands. This characterized the childhood of Oscar, who played the violin and piano. In 1914, van Hemel successfully completed his violin studies at the Antwerp Conservatory. Three days later, on his birthday, World War I broke out.

Van Hemel was a moderately modern composer who used classical musical forms combined with atonal harmonies and melodies. He applied the twelve-tone technique, bitonality, “germ cell technique” and serialism but continued to strive to captivate his audience through lyricism. In the First Violin Concerto, for instance, the orchestration is particularly colourful and accessible.