Closson, Ernest(b Brussels, 10 Dec 1870; d Brussels, 21 Dec 1950). Belgian musicologist. He was self-educated in both music and musicology, and worked at the Museum of MusicalInstruments at the Brussels Conservatory, first as assistant curator (18961924) andthen in succession to Victor-Charles Mahillon, the museums founder, as chief curator(192435). Concurrently he was professor of music history at the conservatories ofBrussels (191235) and Mons (191735), and a regular music critic for Indpendencebelge (192040).Clossons enormous output of books and articles reflects an open, independent andreceptive mind, yet without any touch of naivety; his boundless enthusiasm wastempered by a proper appreciation of the importance of supporting speculation by fact.This is evident, for instance, in the exhaustive documentation of his study of BeethovensFlemish inheritance (1928). A preoccupation with Flemish or Belgian music informs manyof his other writings (e.g. his monographs on Csar Franck, Lassus, Grtry and Gevaert),his anthology of popular Belgian songs (1905), and his monograph Les nol wallons(1909). Closson also wrote authoritatively on the basse danse; in his last years anabiding interest in organology culminated in a history of the piano (1944). Besides beingan important popularizer of music in Belgium he was influential in securing therecognition of musicology as a serious academic discipline in Belgian universities, and inhaving it introduced as a degree course in 1931.WRITINGSSiegfried de Richard Wagner: tude esthtique et musicale (Brussels, 1891)Edvard Grieg et la musique scandinave (Paris, 1892)Les concerts populaires de Bruxelles (donns sous la direction de Joseph Dupont,18731898) (Brussels, 1898)Les origines lgendaires de Feuersnoth de R. Strauss (Brussels, 1902)Linstrument de musique comme document ethnographique (Brussels, 1902) [orig.pubd in Guide musical (26 Jan2 March 1902)]Les chansons populaires des provinces belges: anthologie (Brussels, 1905, 3/1920)with A. Doutrepont: Les nols wallons (Lige, 1909, 2/1938 also with M. Delbouille)Notes sur lonomatope, BSIM, vii/7 (1911), 2635Le manuscrit dit des basses danses de la bibliothque de Bourgogne (Brussels,1912/R)Notes sur la chanson populaire en Belgique (Brussels, 1913)Roland de Lassus (Turnhout, 1919)Andr-Modeste Grtry (Turnhout, 1920)Esthtique musicale: les matriaux de la musique: la cration et linterprtationmusicales (Brussels, 1921)Nietzsche et Bizet, ReM, iii/68 (19212), 14754Csar Franck (18221890) (Charleroi, 1923)Llment flamand dans Beethoven (Brussels, 1928, enlarged 2/1946; Eng. trans.,1936)Gevaert (Brussels, 1929)Une nouvelle srie de hautbois gyptiens antiques, Studien zur Musikgeschichte:Festschrift fr Guido Adler (Vienna, 1930), 1725La facture des instruments de musique en Belgique (Brussels, 1935)Le lied nerlandais ancien dans ses accointances avec le lied populaire allemand(Antwerp, 1939)Histoire du piano (Brussels, 1944; Eng. trans., 1947, rev. 2/1974 by R. Golding)Un facteur belge oubli, Nicolaus-Marcel Raingo de Mons, Hommage Charlesvan den Borren, ed. S. Clercx and A. vander Linden (Antwerp, 1945), 14048Llment celtique irlandais dans le chant liturgique, Miscellanea musicologicaFloris van der Mueren (Ghent, 1950), 635ed., with C. van den Borren: La musique en Belgique du Moyen Age nos jours(Brussels, 1950) [incl. Le dix-neuvime sicle et lpoque contemporaine, 23797;Le folklore, 30314; La facture instrumentale, 45165]BIBLIOGRAPHYMlanges Ernest Closson (Brussels, 1948) [incl. C. van den Borren: ErnestClosson, lhomme, le savant, le professeur, 717; A.-M. Regnier and A. van derLinden: Bibliographie des oeuvres dErnest Closson, 1829]C. van den Borren: Ernest Closson in memoriam, RBM, v (1951), 68