5 world famous Belgian musicians you should listen to
Belgium is a country of many cultures and languages. But music makes differences between countries and people disappear. These are five Belgian music artists should know.
1. Danzel
He’s 40 years old, but some teenagers in Belgium still remember his “Pump It Up”, a hit that climbed up to the 11th place in the prestigious UK Singles Chart.
Danzel’s music is house, techno and dance. Between 2003 and 2011 he almost every year published a new single, and his “Jump” (2007) was in the top-10 of music hits in Australia, Spain, Italy, Belgium andJapan.
He has been awarded Artist of the Year Price by the Polish Eska Music Awards (2005). In fact, he has a lot of fans in Poland. Futhermore, he tried to represent this country in Eurovision 2006.
2. Fabrizio Cassol
This saxophonist is famous beause of his music for dance and theatre, and also because of his band Aka Moon. We chose Cassol because his instrument was invented by another Belgian, Adolphe Sax, in 1840.
Fabrizio studied at the Liège Conservatory and he’s the first musician to use the aulochrome, a double soprano saxophone. In 1992, he joined bassist Michel Hatzigeorgiou and drummer Stéphane Galland to create Aka Moon, a jazz group of three people that also plays rock music.
3. Pierre Kolp
Kolp was born in Cologne (Germany) in 1969, but we should consider this composer as a Belgian. His studies in composition (Conservatory of Brussels) and Musicology (Free University of Brussels) were all in Belgium.
He composed several pieces of music for orchestra. Also chamber music for wind instruments are part of his repertoire. But one of hismost beautiful works are the piano pieces for the instrument he plays.
In 1994, Kolp won the Belgian Artistic and Musical Promotion Award, and in 1995 he was awarded in The Younger European Composers Competition. He is one of the best songwriter, composer and music pedagoge in Belgium.
4. Stromae
Paul van Haver (1985) is the real name of this musician, born in Brussels. He created his artists name in ‘verlan’, the French argot that change the syllabes order. In fact, he was first Maestro and then changed it into Stromae.
In 2008 he worked forthe music radio station NRJ. Two years later he was nominated Best Dutch and Belgian Act at the MTV Europe Music Awards. Finally, in 2011 he got the European Border Breakers Award.
From his rap music till now, his music has been influenced by other techno musicians and, because of his father’s origin, Congolese music. His song Papoutai was number 1 all around the world in 2013.
5. Lara Fabian
Having both Canadian and Belgian citizenship, she is the best-selling Belgian woman singer in the history. From classical crossover to acoustic, with a major pop-rock music repertoire, she was 4th in 1988 Eurovision Song Contest representing Luxembourg.
The song Croire was a real hit and the start of a very nice career. Fabian is both a composer and a singer, and she is able to speak French, English and even Spanish. In 2017 she published a new single Camouflage.
