Wouter Vandenabeele
Wouter Vandenabeele is an internationally renowned violinist, arranger and composer. His productivity and versatility have reached tops during the last decade, in which he played concerts with the Senegalese traditional violinist Issa Sow and conducted the prestigious project Hadzidakis for the Olympic Games of Athens in (participants were among others Teresa Salgueiro, Lucilla Galeazzi, Joji Hirota, Kari Bremnes and Eva De Roovere).
He also recorded more than 20 CD’s, performed hundreds of shows with Ambrozijn and his world music orchestra Olla Vogala and created the Moroccan–Flemish project Brared Ataï, with whom he played concerts in Belgium and Morocco. For the project Zuidenwind (EMI) he joined forces with South African musicians and played numerous concerts in Belgium and South Africa (a.o. in Soweto).
He recorded three solo albums (Chansons)
Wouter was invited by the city council of Ghent to compose music to accompany the fireworks at the celebration of the national holiday and was asked to perform at the opening of the Trade Fair in Ghent. For this last project he collaborated with Steve Houben, Erik Vermeulen, Savina Yanatou, Philippe Thuriot, Ex Tempore and many others. He played at several major English festivals (among which Womex and National Theater in London) with the Senegalese band Daby Baldé. Last year he performed in Amman (Jordan), beirut (lebanon) with Macadi Nahhas and recorded an abum with Mami Kanouté and Baaba Maal.
Now he is working with GFVP: young violin players, Elias Bachoura and Shalan Alhamwy from Syria and a project with Slowakian Roma musicians in Ghent.
Furthermore, he is an enthusiastic and motivational teacher who is involved in several schooling projects such as the international youth musical training course Flanders Ethno, the international summer academy of Neufchâteau, training sessions for young musicians in Cyprus and Sweden, the Folk and Jazz training courses organized by Muziekmozaïek. He also used to conduct the instrumental ensemble at the annual folk music summer school in Gooik. Since September 2005, he teaches folk violin in the music academy of Sint-Niklaasand conducted the youth orchestra Transpiradansa.
His new project TAMALA (with Senegal musicians) won the the Klara prize (best CD) He organised three times a succesfull fiddle festival in 'De Centrale' in Ghent, in 2015, 2016 and 2017
Languages : Dutch, English, French
