Louis Ignatius Gall - Biography
Louis Ignatius Gall was born in Indonesia.
As a child he came to The Netherlands with his mother Elly Goewie. He started playing guitar under the wings of the guitarteacher Daan van Teeseling and played along in string orchestra Con Amore which was conducted by Daan van Teeseling.
Louis Ignatius Gall was accepted in the young talent class of the conservatory of Utrecht. Dick Visser became his teacher. Soon after Louis Ignatius Gall had to join the army. In the army he was playing percussion in the military band.
(Photo left: the military band with Louis Ignatius Gall on the last row, third from the left).
After the army Louis Ignatius Gall started studying at the conservatory of Den Haag. He had lessons with Koos Tigges and Kees van Baaren.
(Photo right: Louis in concert with .... Van Teeseling).
Koos Tigges soon realized Louis Ignatius Gall was a better classical guitarist then Koos Tigges himself. Kees van Baaren made sure Louis Ignatius Gall could audition with Andrés Segovia. Segovia saw Gall's talented and invited Gall to join Segovia's courses in Santiago de Compostela.
(Left: Louis Ignatius Gall in Santiago de Compostela playing for Andrés Segovia)
Louis Ignatius Gall studied in Santiago de Compostela together with John Williams. Segovia was satisfied with the playing of Louis Ignatius Gall but not about Gall's guitar. Segovia made sure Gall could by a Herman Hauser II guitar as fast as possible. Later, in 1976, Gall bought another Hauser-guitar. The guitars nowadays are valued around 40.000 Euro but back then Gall paid 1000 DM (Photo right).
After Santiago de Compostela followed many years of performing and composing. Often Louis played as a soloist but he also played quite regurlarly in ensembles like in the Berkshire Chamber Ensemble. He played many concerts in the U.S.A. with this ensemble, including concerts in Carnegie Hall (Photo right).
After working shortly at many conservatories (including Zwolle) in the 70's Gall accepted a job offer from the conservatory in Enschede. Gall worked at this conservatory over 30 years. Meanwhile his mother started a sheet music publishing company called ELGO. From that moment on Gall's music was exclusively published with ELGO. Books for guitarteaching, compositions for solo, ensemble, group lessons: more then 500 publications are in the ELGO catelogue.
(Left: Louis Ignatius Gall teaching at the Enschede conservatory)
Louis Ignatius Gall kept playing concerts as a guitarist and lutist. Meanwhile he taught a big group of guitarists. Some of them later beame quite famous soloists, teachers and composers including Edith Leerkes (Herman van Veen), Robert Horna, Hugo Almeida, Gerard Cousins,Sophie Hollins, Boyan Bukov, Marcel Boelaars, Ivanildo Kowsoleea, Bobby Rootveld and Lars Wüller.
The last years Louis Ignatius Gall mainly performed with flutist Ferenc Hutyra (Links).
Together with Anja Schäfers Gall released a duo cd. In 2014, during the Louis Ignatius Gall Music Festival in kulturhaus NIHZ (Germany) his first solo cd was released. During this festival the documentary about Gall's life was also released and the concert Gall played here would be his last public performance (Photo at the right).
The last years of his life Gall focused mainly on composing. These compositions were dedicated to Reinbert Evers, Humphrey Baumann Fred Rootveld and mostly to Duo NIHZ (Bobby Rootveld & Sanna van Elst). In March 2016 Gall passed away. He chose Duo NIHZ to be with him during his last hours. During his last day he composed one final composition, a short solo-piece dedicated to his doctor Jan de Heer.
