François van Campenhout (5 February 1779 – 24 April 1848) was a Belgian opera singer, conductor and composer. He composed the music for the Belgian national anthem, "

La Brabançonne "" ( (La Brabançonne); ; ) is the national anthem of Belgium. The originally French title refers to the Duchy of Brabant; the name is usually untranslated in Belgium's other two official languages, Dutch and German. History According to le ...

". Campenhout was born in

Brussels Brussels, officially the Brussels-Capital Region, (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) is a Communities, regions and language areas of Belgium#Regions, region of Belgium comprising #Municipalit ...

, where he studied

violin The violin, sometimes referred to as a fiddle, is a wooden chordophone, and is the smallest, and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in regular use in the violin family. Smaller violin-type instruments exist, including the violino picc ...

. He worked initially as an office clerk, but soon pursued a career as a musician. After he had been a violist at the ''Théâtre de la Monnaie'' (or ''Muntschouwburg'') in Brussels for a while, he started a career as a tenor at the ''Opera in Ghent''. This was the beginning of a successful opera career, which brought him to Brussels,

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, Paris,

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The Hague The Hague ( ) is the capital city of the South Holland province of the Netherlands. With a population of over half a million, it is the third-largest city in the Netherlands. Situated on the west coast facing the North Sea, The Hague is the c ...

Lyon Lyon (Franco-Provençal: ''Liyon'') is a city in France. It is located at the confluence of the rivers Rhône and Saône, to the northwest of the French Alps, southeast of Paris, north of Marseille, southwest of Geneva, Switzerland, north ...

and

Bordeaux Bordeaux ( ; ; Gascon language, Gascon ; ) is a city on the river Garonne in the Gironde Departments of France, department, southwestern France. A port city, it is the capital of the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region, as well as the Prefectures in F ...

. In 1828, he ended his career as a singer and became conductor in Brussels, where he died in 1848. He is buried at Brussels Cemetery in

Evere Evere (; ) is one of the 19 municipalities of the Brussels-Capital Region (Belgium). , the municipality had a population of 43,608 inhabitants. The total area is , which gives a population density of . In common with all of Brussels' municipal ...

, Brussels. Campenhout wrote a large number of works: operas such as ''Grotius ou le Château de Lovesteyn'' and ''Passe-Partout'', which were successful, and he also composed ballet music, symphonies and choir music. He wrote the music of the ''Brabançonne'' in September 1830, to a text by Alexandre Dechet (Jenneval). Van Campenhout was a

freemason Freemasonry (sometimes spelled Free-Masonry) consists of fraternal groups that trace their origins to the medieval guilds of stonemasons. Freemasonry is the oldest secular fraternity in the world and among the oldest still-existing organizati ...

and a member of the

Grand Orient of Belgium The Grand Orient of Belgium (, ; or G.O.B.) is a Belgian cupola of masonic lodges which is only accessible for men, and works in the basic three symbolic degrees of freemasonry. History The Grand Orient of Belgium was founded in 1833, three y ...

Sources

* VERGAUWEN (David), "Frans Van Campenhout als patriot en vrijmetselaar. Episodes uit het leven van de auteur van de Brabançonne", in: ''Belgisch Tijdschrift voor Muziekwetenschap'', Vol. LXVII, 2013, pp. 115–134.
La Brabançonne
1779 births 1848 deaths Belgian male classical composers Musicians from the Austrian Netherlands Belgian Romantic composers Belgian conductors (music) 19th-century Belgian male opera singers Belgian male conductors (music) National anthem writers Musicians from Brussels Belgian Freemasons 19th-century Belgian classical composers {{Belgium-opera-singer-stub Burials at Brussels Cemetery