The Royal Conservatory of Brussels Appoints New Composition Faculty

Martin Loridan and Lukas Ligeti have joined the school as its two new composition professors

Belgium’s Royal Conservatory of Brussels has appointed Lukas Ligeti and Martin Loridan as its two new professors of composition. They will both begin their tenures at the school as of the current academic year. 

Hailing from France, Loridan is also a professor of advanced training in contemporary languages ​​at the Royal Conservatory of Brussels. 

Published by BabelScores, his music is regularly performed by internationally renowned artists such as Claude Delangle, Rohan de Saram, the Arditti Quartet, Klangforum Wien, Fractales, and Mise-en, ensemble Accroche note, among others.  

Loridan is a graduate of the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique de Paris and completed his doctoral studies at the University of Leeds. Now, he is a guest professor at the Royal Academy of Music, Stony Brook University, and the Kazakh National University of Arts. Among his awards include Vienna’s Reinl Foundation Prize, Paris’s André Jolivet Prize, and the Vareler Prize of Berlin. 

An Austrian-American composer, Ligeti is a drummer active in jazz and free improvisation and has worked on live electronics and numerous intercultural projects. Among other interests, his music is influenced by the European avant-garde, African traditions, jazz, and the New York experimental music scene. 

His commissions have included those from Ars Musica/Brussels Philharmonic, MDR Symphony Orchestra Leipzig, American Composers Orchestra, Tonkünstler Orchestra Niederösterreich, Prague State Opera, Vienna Festwochen, Bang On A Can, Tonhalle Düsseldorf, and many more. His numerous awards include the CalArts Alpert Award in Music in 2010. 

A graduate of the University of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna, Ligeti studied composition with Erich Urbanner and jazz drums with Fritz Ozmec. He also earned a PhD from the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg and was mentored by John Zorn, George Crumb, and Jonathan Harvey, among others. 

Until 2021, he was a professor in the PhD program in Integrated Composition, Improvisation and Technology at the University of California, and also taught at the University of Pretoria. Currently based in Miami, Ligeti will be moving to Brussels early next year to be closer to his new role. 

“I am delighted to announce that I have joined the faculty of the Royal Conservatory of Brussels as Professor of Composition as of September,” Ligeti posted on Facebook. “...I’m really looking forward to working here and also invite anyone wanting to study composition in such an environment to take a closer look. As in most European countries, composition studies are offered at the bachelor's and master's level, but a doctoral program in Composition/Artistic Research is also emerging, and we are looking forward to welcoming doctoral students as well.”