Nederlands Jeroen Billiet
Jeroen Billiet (b. 1977, Tielt) studied at the Royal Conservatories of Ghent and Brussels under Luc Bergé, where he passed his final horn exam with distinction in 2001. He continued his studies with lessons from Froydis Ree Wekre, specialising in his great passion for historical instruments with teachers such as Claude Maury and Anthony Halstead. This was followed by a career that saw him perform with some of the most prominent early music ensembles: Concerto Köln, i Giardino Armonico, Il Fondamento, l'Orchestre des Champs-Élysées, l’Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique, and the Irish Baroque Orchestra. From 2002 to 2009, he served as solo horn with Les Musiciens du Louvre-Grenoble (under Marc Minkowski), and from 2012 to 2018 with the Insula Orchestra (under Laurence Equilbey).
He is currently a soloist with Le Concert d'Astrée (under Emmanuelle Haïm), Les Talens Lyriques (under Christophe Rousset), and co-principal horn with B'Rock Ghent. As a member of these ensembles, he has performed at nearly all major European music festivals and has contributed to over 70 CD and DVD recordings. The Phaedra label released his internationally acclaimed solo CD Fall Now Blows Its Horn in 2010, which brought the lyrical Flemish horn repertoire back into the spotlight. In 2016, a second solo CD, Chants d'Amour, featuring works from the Liège and Brussels romantic horn traditions as well as Johannes Brahms' trio Opus 40, was released by the Terra Nova label. He has also specialised in interpreting the rich Belgian romantic horn repertoire and has given numerous recitals, lecture-performances, and solo concerts both in Belgium and internationally.
In June 2008, Jeroen earned the title of Laureate of the Orpheus Institute. He has served as a lecturer and department chairman at the Royal Conservatory in Antwerp, as a researcher and lecturer at KASK & Conservatorium in Ghent, and as a horn teacher at the Stedelijk Conservatorium in Bruges. In July 2019, Jeroen Billiet, alongside his Conservatory colleague Rik Vercruysse, organised the successful 51st International Horn Symposium, which attracted over 700 horn players from 40 different countries to Ghent city centre. The associated street festival Wake the Dragon included the breaking of the world record for the largest horn ensemble of all time, during an impressive open-air concert at Ghent's Sint-Baafsplein.
In September 2021, Jeroen Billiet succeeded his former teacher Luc Bergé as Principal Study Teacher of Horn at the Koninklijk Conservatorium Brussel (Erasmushogeschool). At the same institution, he has also held the chair for research in the Department of Orchestral Instruments since 2022.
Jeroen Billiet was awarded the prestigious Punto Award by the International Horn Society in recognition of his international career as a player, teacher, and researcher. On 29 March 2021, he obtained his Doctorate in Arts with a historical-artistic study of the Ghent horn tradition during the Belle Époque at Ghent University.
