- Van Hove collaborated with a number of his fellow Belgian musicians, and in 1996 was given the title of Cultural Ambassador of Flanders by the Belgian government.
- He composed music for film and theatre, and taught local musicians in Berlin.
- He began an association with saxophonist Peter Brötzmann in 1966, playing on his early quartet and sextet recordings including 1968's Machine Gun album, and then as part of a trio with Brötzmann and drummer Han Bennink.
- In the 1960s and 1970s he performed with saxophonist Peter Brötzmann and drummer Han Bennink.
- He was a Belgian jazz musician and a pioneer of European free jazz.
- Van Hove played in a number of duos, notably with saxophonists Steve Lacy and Lol Coxhill and with trombonists Albert Mangelsdorff and Vinko Globokar.
- He held workshops in Germany, France, England, Belgium, and the Netherlands, and held studios at the University of Lille III.
- Fred Van Hove was a pianist, accordionist, church organist, and carillonist, an improviser and a composer.
- Van Hove studied musical theory, harmony and piano in Belgium.
- One of Fred Van Hove's credos was that improvised music didn't exist before it was played. He believed that the improvising musician had to create his own vocabulary on his instrument in order to achieve a unique sound. "Improvisation, you have never heard it before and you will never hear it again because it will never be the same again", he said.
Contribute to this page
Suggest an edit or add missing content