Arts initiative and artistic policy: a institutional, financial and programming history of the Philharmonic Society of Brussels and the NIR and its orchestra's between 1929 and 1960

Government support of the arts is a restricted phenomenon, both geographically and in time. Outside continental Europe and beyond the post-war period, arts initiative has always been the result of an interaction between public and private agents. Belgium is no exception. Many art institutions have started at the private initiative of some prominent citizens. They only became dependent on government support from 1930 onwards as a consequence of the process of professionalisation and the construction of the welfare state. No systematic historical research has been devoted to the founding and institutionalising of the leading Belgian orchestras and concert organisations during this period, with a focus on the interaction of private and public initiative. Such a study should investigate precisely the impact of the institutional and financial conditions on the artistic policy. Because of real lack of such an inquiry, research had to start with the collection of data. During the preliminary research that has been carried out already, the sources about the Belgian orchestras and organisations have been catalogued, and a rudimentary relational database designed. This preliminary research leads to the present interdisciplinary project, which should explore the questions in musicological, historical and sociological perspectives on Ph.D. level. The aim of this research is to arrive at an understanding of the relationship between systems of financing and institutional conditions on the one hand, and artistic policy and music programming on the other, of the two leading concert institutions of Belgium: the Philharmonic Society of Brussels (a private initiative) and the N.I.R. (a public initiative), with their orchestras: the National Orchestra of Belgium and the Big Symphonic Orchestra of the N.I.R., respectively, during the period of 1929 to 1960.