In the 1920s, two violin prizes were created in Verviers to pay tribute to two great violinists from Verviers. The Henry Vieuxtemps Prize in 1921 and the Edouard Deru Prize in 1928 were given an organizing committee and regulations approved by the Verviers City Council from the outset.

Since their creation, the Prizes, whose respective regulations have been amended over time (the last amendment to the regulations of the Prix Deru in November 2022 and the Prix Vieuxtemps in November 2024), have been regularly awarded. The last Henry Vieuxtemps and Edouard Deru Prizes were awarded in 2023.

In 1958, another prize was established, at the initiative of the Cercle verviétois in Brussels, for a student of the Verviers Conservatory of Music. Initially awarded every three years, this prize became biennial in 1975. In the case of this prize, it was the Conservatory that managed the awarding of the prize.

These three Prizes were created from donations (60,000 francs from the Vieuxtemps Centenary Organising Committee in 1921 and 55,000 francs from the widow of Edouard Deru in 1928, 34,000 francs in 1958 and 11,000 francs in 1974 from the Cercle verviétois in Brussels).

To give new impetus to the two Violin Competitions, a non-profit organization was created in 2015 at the initiative of the Conservatory, the Academy of Fine Arts, and the Verviers Cultural Center. In agreement with the heads of the Deru and Vieuxtemps committees, as well as the management of the Conservatory, this new non-profit organization, “Prix Artistiques de la Ville de Verviers,” aims to organize competitions and events that encourage and promote young artists.

Since its creation, the non-profit organization of the Artistic Prizes of the City of Verviers has organized the Edouard Deru and Henry Vieuxtemps Competitions in 2017, 2020 and 2023. In order to highlight the teaching within the music academies present in the territory of the three communities of the country, the non-profit organization launched in 2017 the organization of a third Competition called “Pizzicatti” intended for violin students not yet enrolled in a higher education establishment. After two first editions (2017 and 2019), for the sake of consistency, the association decided to name this new Competition after another illustrious violinist from Verviers: Mathieu Crickboom.

In order to restore the Henry Vieuxtemps Competition to its former glory, the non-profit organization decided in 2024 to focus all its energy on its organization by no longer associating it with the other competitions supported by the association. In light of the many upheavals within the structure of Belgian higher education in the arts, it was also decided to put the organization of the Edouard Deru Competition on hold while awaiting a new version of its regulations.