Guillaume Lekeu - Overture after Victor Hugo's Les Burgraves (1890)

Guillaume Lekeu

 (20 January 1870 – 21 January 1894) was a Belgian composer of classical music.

Overture after Victor Hugo's Les Burgraves (1890)  

Conducted by Pierre Bartholomee with the Orchestre Philharmonique de Liege.

I. Part one - 00:00
II. Part Two - 13:00

Lekeu (1870-94) was born in the village of Heusy in Belgium and began his musical studies at a conservatory nearby. In 1888, his family moved to Paris and he entered the Paris Conservatory where first he studied with César Franck and after Franck's death, with Vincent d'Indy. Tragically, Lekeu died of typhoid fever just after his 24th birthday. The usually critical Debussy regarded Lekeu to be as talented as Franck and d'Indy regarded him a genius.

Lekeu contracted typhoid fever from a contaminated sorbet in October 1893. He died in his parents' home in Angers on 21 January 1894, the day after his 24th birthday. on 26 January 1894, he was buried in a small cemetery in Heusy.