Luc  Brewaeys (Compositor) 

Entrevistamos a Luc Brewaeys, compositor belga, de amplia formación como pianista, director de orquesta y compositor. Como compositor se formó con algunos de los grandes creadores del siglo XX como son Laporte, Donatoni, Ferneyhough o Xenakis. Su catálogo es amplísimo y diverso.

Brewaeys tiene un exquisito sentido del humor y una gran perseverancia. La música de Brewaeys tiene a menudo una lectura dramática. Su música sinfónica, tiene 8 Sinfonías, es muchas veces densa y compleja. Los caminos estilísticos de Brewaeys son muy variados. Conocido como compositor de música espectral, Luc Brewaeys es un orquestador prodigioso y así lo ha demostrado en numerosas ocasiones. Su música es a veces desafiantemente compleja y no siempre accesible.

Escrupuloso en su trabajo, sus texturas son siempre despejadas. Brewaeys se las arregla para producir sonoridades exuberantes, manejando con maestría a los distintos grupos instrumentales, especialmente a la percusión. Pero más allá de las atmósferas que crea hay mucho ingenio, sonoridades creativas.

Luc Brewaeys: My sense of humour, my perseverance.

2. Ruth Prieto: What is composition for you in this day and age?

Luc Brewaeys: It is my life, something that makes me myself. It´s also a way of communicating with the world.

3. Ruth Prieto: What inspires you as a composer and why?

Luc Brewaeys: Music itself inspires me, for some strange reason I never have extra-musical inspiration, except maybe some kind of emotions. I don´t know why that is, but that´s how it is for me.

4. R. P.: Can you define «contemporary»? And in which way Luc Brewaeys is “contemporary”?

Luc Brewaeys: Contemporary music is of course music written now, but I also understand it as art music of today, regardless of style. I compose so-called spectral music, it´s a rather recent direction in music. The way I use those techniques and the way I organise my notes makes me, I believe contemporary.

5. R. P.: What is your main obsession when working?

Luc Brewaeys: To compose the best possible music, music which I like the most for myself.

6. R.P.: How is your creative process?

Luc Brewaeys: The writing of the score is the last step in my creative process. I never made sketches, always composed immediately in ink on paper. As many colleagues I use the computer to compose, I work with the Sibelius software. When I get a commission for a new piece, I first do a lot of thinking, which can last for years if necessary. I try things out, work out timbres, notes, rhythms, dynamics and so on in my mind. Only when a piece is ready for about 80% in my head I start the actual writing of the score. When I was younger I rarely changed anything to my plans, since some 14 years now (with my Symphony n° 6) I allow intuition when I´m writing the score, so sometimes I decide on the direction in which the music goes during the writing, but I always keep in mind what I have imagined before.

7. R.P.: What are you working on now?

Luc Brewaeys: On a work for 8 players without conductor called “Eppur si muove” for the Ensemble Oxalys which will première it in my hometown Vilvoorde next October 4. Also working on an orchestra work commissioned by the Amsterdam Concertgebouw Orchestra.

8. R.P.: What are your musical roots (real or imaginary)?

Luc Brewaeys: I´ve had (and probably still have) many influences, as a Belgian I have roots in both the Germanic as in the Roman tradition, it gives my music a particular kind of sound mixture. I´m also an Italy-lover, I studied there, it surely also has influence on what and how I write.

9. R.P.: What virtues does a composer have to have? And defects?

Luc Brewaeys: Discipline and patience, of course also a vivid imagination. I wouldn´t  know of any defects…

10. R.P.: If you had not been a composer, what would you like to have been?

Luc Brewaeys: A historian.

11. R.P.: What has your greatest extravagance been?

Luc Brewaeys: I have absolutely no idea, I don´t think I´m very extravagant.

12. R.P.: What does music contribute to education?

Luc Brewaeys: It broadens your mind.

13. R.P.: What is silence?

Luc Brewaeys: The absence of (concrete) sound, also my mind at peace.

14. R.P.: Who would you rescue from the past?

Luc Brewaeys: Nobody in particular, maybe Igor Stravinsky.

15. R.P.: What´s interesting about the present?

Luc Brewaeys: Many things, I find it difficult to answer this question.

16. R.P.: What do you expect from the future?

Luc Brewaeys: Having been a few times very close to death due to illnesses I don´t expect very much from the future. I hope to remain healthy enough in order to be able to compose many more good works.

17. R.P.: What would be your advice to a young composer?

Luc Brewaeys: Listen a lot to (recent) music, preferably with the score, in order to learn how to do things. It will lead you towards your own style. You should as it were “eat” music.

18. R.P.: Which musician(s) or work(s) have made an impression on you as a composer?

Luc Brewaeys: Igor Stravinsky : Le sacre du printemps
Charles Ives: Three places in New England
Edgard Varèse : Arcana
Luciano Berio : Sinfonia
Iannis Xenakis : Antikhthon & Jonchaies
Tristan Murail : Gondwana
Brian Ferneyhough : La terre est un homme
Steve Reich : Tehillim
Pierre Boulez : Répons
Jonathan Harvey : Mortuos plango, vivos voco & Madonna of Winter and Spring

19. R.P.: Have you got a composer of reference?

Luc Brewaeys: Not really.

20. R.P.: Have you got any eccentricities when composing?

Luc Brewaeys: I wouldn´t know, I don´t think so.

21. R.P.: A "must" film

Luc Brewaeys: The usual suspects.

22. R.P.: Recommend us a book

Luc Brewaeys: Il deserto dei Tartari (The deserts of the Tartars) by Dino Buzzati.

23. R.P.: A song that puts right an off day

Luc Brewaeys: No song, “Madonna of Winter and Spring” by Jonathan Harvey.

24. R.P.: What have you not yet been asked to do in music?

Luc Brewaeys: I wouldn´t know. Till now I´ve been lucky enough to be able to compose what I wanted and to get commissions for that.

25. R.P.: What would Luc Brewaeys say about Luc Brewaeys?

Luc Brewaeys: I know that I´m a pretty good composer, but I think I would say that I take my job seriously, but don´t take myself seriously too much. Humour is a very powerful ´weapon´, it also helped me through my heavy medical problems of the past 7 years, so I think it´s very important to me. For the rest I´m someone who likes the good life. I would rather enjoy things than doing everything to get (very) old. In any case my music is the most important thing for me and it (also) keeps me going on.