Yves Knockaert
Yves Knockaert was born on 11 April 1954 in Bruges. He studied Art History and Archeology with an option in Musicology at the Rijksuniversiteit Gent, graduating in 1976 after writing a licenciate thesis on Aspects of Contemporary Vocal Music in Works by Berio, Kagel and Nono. In parallel with his studies in Musicology he studied solfège and harmony at the Royal Conservatory in Ghent, where he earned first prizes in 1972, and 1978. In 1980, Knockaert earned a second prize in counterpoint at the Royal Conservatory in Brussels.
As a composer he took courses in contemporary music and analysis with Iannis Xenakis (Lille, 1980), Mauricio Kagel (Aix-en-Provence, 1981), Franco Donatoni, Brian Ferneyhough and Hans Werner Henze (Siena, 1982) and Luciano Berio (Aix-en-Provence, 1983). Yves Knockaert was active as a composer in the 1980s, writing his last works in 1989. Because of his musicological activities since 1990, he has set aside composition for a undetermined period.
At present Knockaert is a teacher of music history, music aesthetics and twentieth-century music at the Lemmens Institute in Leuven. He has been a member of the artistic committee of the Orpheus Institute since its inception in 1997 and a guest teacher in contemporary music at the department of Audiovisual and Visual Arts at the Karel de Grote-Hogeschool in Antwerp. Since 2001, this musicologist has taught music history at the Muziekkapel Koningin Elisabeth. Since 1990 he has produced a number of radio series on twentieth-century music and given lectures for numerous cultural organisations in Flanders. Knockaert is also a contributor to various cultural periodicals such as Contra., Adem and ProScenio and he frequently publishes in book form. His book Wendingen, Muziek en filosofie in postmodern perspectief (Changes of course, Music and philosophy in a postmodern perspective) was published in 1997, and his 1998 collaboration with Mark Delaere and Herman Sabbe resulted in the book Nieuwe Muziek in Vlaanderen.
Until 2019 he taught music history, music philosophy and contemporary music at LUCA School of Arts, Campus Lemmens in Leuven. From 2006 until 2011 he was director of the Institute for Artistic Research of the KU Leuven.