Emiel Verneert (°2002) is a young Belgian jazz trumpet player. He picked up the trumpet at the age of 7, following lessons at het local music school and playing in the bigband. It didn’t take long before he developed a great passion for jazz music, inspired by Miles Davis album ‘Kind of Blue’ and the music of Chet Baker. In 2019 Emiel started a fulltime music study (jazz) at the MUDA Arts College in Ghent, Belgium In the same year he was selected for the youth project of the Brussels Jazz Orchestra: The Youth Jazz Collective, a project for talented young jazzplayers led by conductors such as Frank Vaganée and Mark Godfroid. A highlight in this period was the masterclass from Vincent Gardner (trombonist in the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, led by Wynton Marsalis). The year after Emiel was accepted at the Jazz Department of the Music Conservatory of Ghent, while still in secondary school. At the age of 19 Emiel recorded his first CD (It Goes On – Youkali Records 2022) with all original compositions, with Enrique Simón on piano, Gil Lachenal on bass, Pedro Vázquez on drums and Filip Verneert on guitar.

Since 2023 Emiel studies at the Jazz Campus of the Musik Akademie in Basel (Switzerland), studying with Ambrose Akinmusire as his trumpet and composition teacher and jazz greats such as Larry Grenadier, Mathieu Michel, Alex Sipiagin, Jason Palmer, Mark Turner and Lionel Loueke. Emiel has already got the opportunity to learn and share the stage with great musicians such as  Jean-Louis Rassinfosse (bass), Aaron Parks (piano), Jeff Ballard (drums), Jim McNeely (piano).

Emiel is inspired by many musicians such as Clifford Brown, Pat Metheny, Tom Harrel, Immanuel Wilkins, Chet Baker, Bert Joris, Cuong Vu, Stephane Belmondo, Freddie Hubbard, Brad Mehldau, Joshua Redman, Kurt Rosenwinkel, Lee Morgan and John Coltrane.