oa C’est aux fruits qu’on connaît l’arbre. Het Belgische muziekonderwijs tijdens het civilising offensive van de belle époque

At the beginning of the belle époque, Belgian education was fully engaged in the first “Schoolstrijd” (school struggle, historical conflict between public and Catholic schools). Under the influence of the liberal civilizing offensive, Belgium built its artistic education into a successful ecosystem. With a research- and practice-oriented approach and an active low-threshold recruitment policy, the conservatories succeeded in getting a broad stratum of the population to develop a passion for music. This article examines the processes that made this boom possible, and at the same time it is a plea for conducting deep fundamental research about our artistic education in the present, past and future.