Hydride vapor phase epitaxy (HVPE) growth of semipolar AlN and GaN layers on planar Si(100) substrates with SiC nanolayer is investigated. It is shown experimentally that the solid-phase epitaxial formation of a specially oriented SiC nucleation layer followed by epitaxy of AlN layer by HVPE at low rates enables growth of aluminum and gallium nitrides in the semipolar direction. For the best GaN(20-23) layers obtained, the full width at half maximum (EWHM) value for the x-ray diffraction rocking curve is 24 arcmin. The photoluminescence spectrum of the semipolar GaN measured at 4 K exhibits bands related to basal-plane and prismatic stacking faults (BSF and PSF). (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.