Paul Gilson was at the heart of the Flemish late Romantic symphonic tradition. A contemporary of Debussy, he wrote much of his orchestral music during the first forty years of his life, with a set of Mlodies cossaises for large string orchestra to set beside the serenades of Tchaikovsky and Dvork, a cyclic set of symphonic sketches, The Sea, ominous incidental music for the play Alvar and a dramatic series of Symphonic Overtures.
