Composer, educationalist and conductor
Born: Harelbeke 17/08/1834
Died: Antwerpen 8/03/1901

Peter Benoit was the director of the Antwerp music school from 1867. The Antwerp music school was elevated till ‘Koninklijk Vlaams Conservatorium’ in 1898. He devoted himself to the use of the mother tongue and the importance of the national anthem in order to preserve the people’s identity. His work was sometimes sentimental and exaggerated, as in the ‘Rubenscantate’ from 1877 and the oratorio ‘De Oorlog’ from 1873