Biography
Early years
At the age of five, the piano caught Samuel’s eye, and by the age of ten he was admitted as one of the youngest students ever to the class of world-renowned pianists Abdel Rahman El Bacha and Dimitris Saroglou at the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapel. In 2010, at an exceptionally young age, he was invited to perform at the International Chopin Days Festival in Flagey and to appear as a soloist in Mozart’s 12th concerto with the Limburgs Youth Symphony Orchestra at deSingel in Antwerp. A year later, he performed at the Royal Palace in Laeken for the Royal Family. From a young age, he has performed together with his brothers in all the major concert halls in Belgium and abroad. In 2012, he performed Shostakovich’s 2nd piano concerto in the Blue Hall of deSingel in Antwerp. Samuel made his radio debut in 2017 on Klara Classics with a performance of Dvořák’s Slavonic Dances, together with his brother Nicholas.
Performances
In addition, he has appeared on stage at many festivals such as Musicorum, Festival of Flanders, Chopin Festival in Flagey, Pianofest, ECAL International, Lions Club, AMUZ, Brescia International Festival, Arte Amanti International Festival, Nagoldtal International Festival, and many more. Samuel has given concerts in Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, Italy, Austria, and France, in venues such as La Monnaie, Bozar, Flagey, the Blue Hall at deSingel, the Henry Le Bœuf Hall, the Royal Palace of Laeken, Schloss Blumendorf, Alden Biesen, and others.
Passions
Samuel also has a passion for chamber music. In 2018, he was selected for the prestigious international ECAL Festival (European Chamber Music Academy in Leipzig) with the clarinet trio Trio de Staël, which he founded. With Trio de Staël, he toured Germany performing in, among others, the birth houses of Mendelssohn and Schumann. For several years now, Samuel has formed a piano–violin duo with Luna De Mol (violinist of the Fibonacci Quartet), with performances in Belgium and the Netherlands. Recently, he also released a CD with bassoonist Elias Agsteribbe, titled Images, on the Etcetera label.
Samuel also specializes in contemporary music, which he regularly premieres. He recently performed John Adams’ Phrygian Gates at the Hamburg Contemporary Music Festival and has collaborated with Belgian composers such as Stephane Vanden Ginste, Nils Van der Plancken, Koen Dejonghe, Jurgen De Pillecyn, Benjamin Van Esser, Frank Nuyts, and Erik Desimpelaere. Together with his brothers, he founded the Pianofest festival in Sint-Niklaas, which has already held three editions and has in the past been awarded distinctions including the Golden Label for Best Classical Music Festival by Klassiek Centraal. The festival welcomes internationally renowned pedagogues and artists such as Boris Berman, Lukas Vondracek, and Severin von Eckardstein.
Honors
As a soloist, Samuel won the National Cantabile Competition (Antwerp 2009, 2012) twice, the Concours de Piano National de Namur (Namur 2009), and was a finalist in the EPTA International Piano Competition for Young Pianists (Waterloo 2015). He also won second and third prize at the Rotary Breughel Competition (Brussels 2010, 2014). In 2015, he took first prize in the Belfius Classics Competition and performed Liszt’s 1st Piano Concerto at La Monnaie with the orchestra Prima la Musica under the direction of Dirk Vermeulen. He also won first prize at the National Stéphan Dejonghe Competition (Aalst 2022).
Education
IIn 2019, Samuel obtained his Master of Arts in Piano with a score of 18/20 at the Royal Conservatory of Brussels in the class of Jan Michiels. In 2020, he continued his studies at the Universität für Musik und darstellende Kunst in Vienna in the class of Christine Karajeva. In 2023, he graduated from the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hamburg with a specialized Master’s degree in Piano in the class of Aleksandar Madzar. The Royal Conservatory of Brussels awarded Samuel the Horlait-Dapsens Prize in 2021. In 2023, the same conservatory presented him with the special Maurice Lefrancq Prize. Among his teachers, Samuel has studied with international artists such as Jean-Claude Vanden Eynden, Markus Groh, Lars Vogt, Bernd Goetzke, Alfredo Perl, Dmitri Bashkirov, Christopher Elton, Boris Berman, Lukas Geniušas, and Jérôme Lowenthal.
Current Activities
Samuel is currently accompanist for the oboe, piccolo, and orchestral conducting classes at the Royal Conservatory of Brussels and is in high demand as an accompanist for exams and concerts both in Belgium and abroad. He has also been accepted as an artist in residence by the organization SWUK.