A French composer born April 8, 1928 in Paris, who died December 11, 2005.
A choirmaster when already a teenager, François Vercken composed choral music as an autodidact. At the age of 27 he entered the Schola Cantorum, studying counterpoint with Daniel-Lesur, harmony and composition with Serge Nigg. Passionately fond of jazz, which reverberates throughout his brass quintet Marina de Talaris (1969), he has shown great curiosity with regard to composers of the Renaissance (Fanfares en mémoire de Claude Lejeune, 1982) and such classical composers as Joseph Haydn or his contemporaries Maurice Ohana, Henri Dutilleux and Guy Reibel.
François Vercken has thus followed his own path without belonging to any particular aesthetic current and in parallel has led a career at French Radio, in Strasburg and Bordeaux and later in the chamber music and retransmissions departments of Radio France.
His output, strongly lyrical in approach, includes works for orchestra (Polytone, 1974; An serpent 1, 1986), chorus (Six instants poétiques, 1980), and also solo instrument (Sine nomine for oboe, 1980) and instrumental ensemble (Diaspora, 1983). His music, often sacred even liturgical in inspiration (Cantate pour le Vendredi-Saint, 1968; Messe pour une fête, 1977), is harmonically sophisticated, uses restricted materials and remains accessible to the greatest number (Lucernaire, 1994).