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Korneel Bernolet

A conductor and harpsichordist, Korneel Bernolet (°1989) is one of the most versatile talents of the international music scene today.

As a conductor, debuting at age 13 leading his own compositions, he works in a repertoire span from Monteverdi till Gershwin, with a preference for opera and oratorio. Between 2015 and 2018 he acted as assistant-conductor for Jos van Immerseel at Anima Eterna Brugge, ending with a highly praised livestreamed guest-conductorship in Beethoven's 9th Symphony and Choir Fantasy in Bruges and Frankfurt. Since 2014 he works closely together with Christophe Rousset as an assistant-conductor and harpsichordist in his orchestra Les Talens Lyriques. Recently he started collaborating with the Flemish Radio Choir as chorus master and assistant to Christoph Prégardien, and with Philippe Herreweghe as pianoforte-continuo, assistant and chorus master at Collegium Vocale Gent; earlier he assisted at B'Rock, cantoLX and Vokalconsort Berlin. As a guest conductor, he led a.o. the Bach Akademie Australia (as festival star of the 2019 Bach edition of the Canberra International Music Festival), Flanders Symphony Orchestra, Anima Eterna Brugge, Collegium Vocale Gent, Transparant Music Theater, International Opera Academy Gent, Symphony Orchestra of the Royal Conservatoire Antwerp, and countless semi-professional ensembles. He works regularly at prestigeous houses such as Vienna State Oper, Theater an der Wien, La Monnaie Brussels, Opéra National du Rhin Nancy, Rudolphinum Prague, Flemish Opera, Valenciana Temple Guanajuato, the Philharmonies of Paris, Cologne, Essen, the Alte Oper Frankfurt, and will soon make his debut as assistant at Teatro alla Scala in Milan.

With his own Apotheosis Orchestra on period instruments, he plays and conducts music from Baroque till the high Romantic era, including Purcell, Bach, Handel, Bernier, Rameau, Telemann, Mozart, Benda, Haydn, Mendelssohn, Brahms, Vaughan-Williams... The group produced several chamber music CDs since 2011, and most recently their orchestral opera début-CD (Pygmalion by Rameau and Benda, released 2019 on Ramée) was internationally praised as a new reference: "Korneel Bernolet is our new Rameau champion" (Classique News).

Korneel Bernolet is active world-wide as a recital soloist (throughout Europe, South-Korea and Australia, with solo appearences at Bach Academy Bruges, BOZAR Brussels, Musikfestspiele Potsdam Sanssouci, Wunderkammer Trieste, Cambridge University, Sydney University, Incheon National University and the Canberra International Music Festival...) and as an ensemble player, amongst the above mentionned also with Il Gardellino (Marcel Ponseele), Flemish Radio Choir (Bart Van Reyn), B'Rock, Mannheimer Hofkapelle, Antwerp Symphony Orchestra, Scherzi Musicali (Nicolas Achten), Transports Publics (Thomas Baeté), Utopia, several smaller ensembles and as a duo partner of Christophe Rousset, Ewald Demeyere and Bart Naessens. If not for the COVID-19 pandemic, this list would also have included 2020-2021 productions with Staatskapelle Dresden and Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, that will hopefully be postponed.

He studied with Paul Clement, Ewald Demeyere, Gustav Leonhardt and Christophe Rousset, and obtained with stellar marks the Master degrees in both harpsichord and conducting at the Royal Conservatoire of Antwerp, where he started teaching already during his final study year. Korneel made his début at the age of 19 as a continuo player with Sigiswald Kuijken's La Petite Bande, was named 'Young Musician of the Year' in 2014 by the Belgian Music Press Association, and two years later was appointed the new Professor of Harpsichord at the Royal Conservatoire of Antwerp, where he teaches on the famous Dulcken 1747 harpsichord at Museum Vleeshuis where he is 'harpsichordist in residence'. He also teaches and conducts at the International Opera Academy Ghent and is doing PhD research at Antwerp University. Lectures, masterclasses and concerts brought him to the conservatories and universities of Manchester, Vilnius, Cambridge, Antwerp and Sydney. His discography, including solo works by Balbastre, Rameau and Weckbacher, now counts some thirty recordings. Several solo recordings were added to the prestigeous online 'All of Bach' series by The Netherlands Bach Society. Besides his concert career, he is a passionate and highly in-demand recording engineer and producer.

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