Morning Concert:
Matthijs Vermeulen

Han Reiziger, the Music Director of VPRO, presents a program of music by Dutch composer Matthijs Vermeulen. Born in 1888 to a blacksmith, Vermeulen originally planned to be a priest but turned to music after being exposed to the theories of counterpoint while attending a seminary. He later moved to Amsterdam where he studied music first with Daniël de Lange, and later with Alphons Diepenbroc, whose daughter he would eventually take to be his second wife. A talented writer Vermeulen supported himself throughout his life by working for a number for newspapers as both a critic and editor covering a wide variety of subjects musical, cultural and political. Vermeulen’s music tended to be rather atonal and in 1918 he got involved in a dispute with the more traditionally minded chief conductor of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Willem Mengelberg, resulting in his moving to France in the hopes of finding a more receptive audience for his works. He returned to the Netherlands after World War II and with the performance of a number of his symphonies eventually gained recognition as own of the country’s best modern composers.