In a media landscape that constantly stimulates children with speed and spectacle, Maestro Fortissimo chooses a strikingly different tone. No hustle, no excess, but attention. For music, and for what is going on in children.
The starting point is as simple as it is unusual: music as an answer. In the programme, Emma Vanthielen and Senne Guns, in his role as Maestro Fortissimo, set out with questions from children. Not casual curiosities, but real concerns. How do you find peace? How do you deal with sadness? How do you get moving again when everything goes wrong?
These are questions that rarely come up so explicitly on children's television – and even more rarely are they answered without words. Because that is precisely what Maestro Fortissimo does: it shifts the focus from explanation to experience. Music is not background here, but a language.
The strength of the programme lies in that consistently executed simplicity. In a studio that feels more like a sound workshop than a television set, experimentation takes place with rhythm, tempo and timbre. Why does a fast cadence wake you up? Why does a low tone sound comforting? The questions are not explained didactically, but made tangible.
This approach connects to a broader movement in which classical music is being approached anew as something living. Not as heritage that needs to be protected, but as material that may be used. In that sense, Maestro Fortissimo is not an introduction to a genre, but an invitation to listen.
It is also striking how seriously the programme takes its audience. Children are not approached here as viewers who need to be entertained, but as people with an emotional world that deserves attention. This translates into the rhythm of the episodes: slow enough to let in, light enough not to weigh down.
Each episode ends with a newly composed piece, tailored to the question of one child and performed by Youth Orchestra Flanders. Not a universal answer, but a personal gesture. As if music here takes on the role of conversation partner.
The result is a programme that is difficult to compare with the rest of the offering. Where much children's television relies on speed and familiarity, Maestro Fortissimo opts for nuance and deceleration. And therein lies its relevance.
Maestro Fortissimocan be seen on Ketnet on Saturday and Sunday around 7.45 am and can also be (re)viewed on VRT MAX.