About Us

Golden River Music was established in 1994 with a primary commitment to publishing new educational repertoire. From day one, promoting the music of talented Belgian composers has been at the heart of our mission. Our small country is home to remarkable talent, and we are dedicated to sharing their music with the world. While still offering a diverse range of educational sheet music, our catalogue has grown to encompass concert music for soloists, ensembles, orchestras, and concert band. Our daily pursuit is to publish top-quality scores and distribute them worldwide.

 

The Artistic Director of Golden River Music, Rik Vercruysse, is also a dedicated horn player and was a lecturer at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Ghent and Antwerp.

 

When people ask us where we found the name of our company, it calls for a little story.

Golden River Music was founded in the former living room of artistic director Rik Vercruysse, in a small town near the river ‘Leie’. The entire area around this river has been historically known for its production of flax since the 13th century. This flax was thrown into the river using a technique called ‘retting’, which facilitated the separation of the fibre from the stem, allowing the flax to be used for producing linen fabrics. The abundance of flax in the river gave it a golden shine, earning it the nickname ‘Golden River’. Although flax has been produced in a more modern way for quite some time, the ‘Leie’ has since been known as the ‘Golden River’, which inspired the name of our publishing house.

Since then, our company has moved a few times, first to Mechelen, close to yet another river, and later to our current building in Dendermonde: an old farmhouse with enough room for the family, as well as a separate building for the growing publishing company.

The days of working from the living room are thankfully long gone, but we still cherish this little piece of history from the early days of Golden River Music.