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Fêtes Galantes (Debussy)
''Fêtes Galantes'' is a cycle of six '' mélodies'' composed by Claude Debussy to poems by Paul Verlaine. It consists of two books of three songs (FL 86 and FL 114). The songs were composed over several years, and were premiered in 1904. History and analysis The six poems come from Verlaine's collection ''Fêtes galantes'', published in 1869. Debussy, a lifelong admirer of Verlaine's poetry, had taken a copy of the collection with him when he went to study in Rome in 1885. Although other composers, from Gabriel Fauré to Benjamin Britten set Verlaine's poetry, Debussy, according to the ''Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'', was the first composer of any importance to do so.Griffiths, Paul"Verlaine, Paul" ''Grove Music Online'', Oxford University Press, 2011, retrieved 13 June 2018 The critic Jacques-Henri Bornecque called Verlaine's book a "petite suite"; it contains twenty-two poems, mostly quite brief, representing varied scenes or encounters ranging from tender to iro ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mélodie
A ''mélodie'' () is a form of French art song, arising in the mid-19th century. It is comparable to the German ''Lied''. A ''chanson'', by contrast, is a folk or popular French song. The literal meaning of the word in the French language is "melody". Nature The ''mélodie'' is often defined by comparison with the ''lied''. Pierre Bernac provides this comparison in ''The Interpretation of French Song'': Debussy goes on to write that 'clarity of expression, precision and concentration of form are qualities peculiar to the French genius.' These qualities are indeed most noticeable when again compared with the German genius, excelling as it does in long, uninhibited outpourings, directly opposed to the French taste, which abhors overstatement and venerates concision and diversity. Bernac writes that "the art of the greatest French composers is an art of suggestion", rather than explicit statement of feelings. The ''mélodie'' is noted for its deliberate and close relationship betwe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Claude Debussy
(Achille) Claude Debussy (; 22 August 1862 – 25 March 1918) was a French composer. He is sometimes seen as the first Impressionist composer, although he vigorously rejected the term. He was among the most influential composers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Born to a family of modest means and little cultural involvement, Debussy showed enough musical talent to be admitted at the age of ten to France's leading music college, the Conservatoire de Paris. He originally studied the piano, but found his vocation in innovative composition, despite the disapproval of the Conservatoire's conservative professors. He took many years to develop his mature style, and was nearly 40 when he achieved international fame in 1902 with the only opera he completed, '' Pelléas et Mélisande''. Debussy's orchestral works include ''Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune'' (1894), ''Nocturnes'' (1897–1899) and ''Images'' (1905–1912). His music was to a considerable extent a r ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Paul Verlaine
Paul-Marie Verlaine (; ; 30 March 1844 – 8 January 1896) was a French poet associated with the Symbolist movement and the Decadent movement. He is considered one of the greatest representatives of the ''fin de siècle'' in international and French poetry. Biography Early life Born in Metz, Verlaine was educated at the ''Lycée Impérial Bonaparte'' (now the Lycée Condorcet) in Paris and then took up a post in the civil service. He began writing poetry at an early age, and was initially influenced by the Parnassien movement and its leader, Leconte de Lisle. Verlaine's first published poem was published in 1863 in ''La Revue du progrès'', a publication founded by poet Louis-Xavier de Ricard. Verlaine was a frequenter of the salon of the Marquise de Ricard (Louis-Xavier de Ricard's mother) at 10 Boulevard des Batignolles and other social venues, where he rubbed shoulders with prominent artistic figures of the day: Anatole France, Emmanuel Chabrier, inventor-poet and humoris ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gabriel Fauré
Gabriel Urbain Fauré (; 12 May 1845 – 4 November 1924) was a French composer, organist, pianist and teacher. He was one of the foremost French composers of his generation, and his musical style influenced many 20th-century composers. Among his best-known works are his ''Pavane (Fauré), Pavane'', Requiem (Fauré), Requiem, ''Sicilienne (Fauré), Sicilienne'', Fauré Nocturnes, nocturnes for piano and the songs Trois mélodies, Op. 7 (Fauré), "Après un rêve" and Clair de lune (Fauré), "Clair de lune". Although his best-known and most accessible compositions are generally his earlier ones, Fauré composed many of his most highly regarded works in his later years, in a more harmony, harmonically and melody, melodically complex style. Fauré was born into a cultured but not especially musical family. His talent became clear when he was a young boy. At the age of nine, he was sent to the École Niedermeyer de Paris, Ecole Niedermeyer music college in Paris, where he w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Benjamin Britten
Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten (22 November 1913 – 4 December 1976, aged 63) was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He was a central figure of 20th-century British music, with a range of works including opera, other vocal music, orchestral and chamber pieces. His best-known works include the opera '' Peter Grimes'' (1945), the '' War Requiem'' (1962) and the orchestral showpiece ''The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra'' (1945). Born in Lowestoft, Suffolk, the son of a dentist, Britten showed talent from an early age. He studied at the Royal College of Music in London and privately with the composer Frank Bridge. Britten first came to public attention with the '' a cappella'' choral work '' A Boy was Born'' in 1934. With the premiere of ''Peter Grimes'' in 1945, he leapt to international fame. Over the next 28 years, he wrote 14 more operas, establishing himself as one of the leading 20th-century composers in the genre. In addition to large-sca ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Grove Dictionary Of Music And Musicians
''The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' is an encyclopedic dictionary of music and musicians. Along with the German-language ''Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart'', it is one of the largest reference works on the history and theory of music. Earlier editions were published under the titles ''A Dictionary of Music and Musicians'', and ''Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians''; the work has gone through several editions since the 19th century and is widely used. In recent years it has been made available as an electronic resource called ''Grove Music Online'', which is now an important part of ''Oxford Music Online''. ''A Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' ''A Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' was first published in London by Macmillan and Co. in four volumes (1879, 1880, 1883, 1889) edited by George Grove with an Appendix edited by J. A. Fuller Maitland in the fourth volume. An Index edited by Mrs. E. Wodehouse was issued as a separate volume in 1890. In ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Antoine Watteau
Jean-Antoine Watteau (, , ; baptised October 10, 1684died July 18, 1721) Alsavailablevia Oxford Art Online (subscription needed). was a French painter and draughtsman whose brief career spurred the revival of interest in colour and movement, as seen in the tradition of Correggio and Rubens. He revitalized the waning Baroque style, shifting it to the less severe, more naturalistic, less formally classical, Rococo. Watteau is credited with inventing the genre of '' fêtes galantes'', scenes of bucolic and idyllic charm, suffused with a theatrical air. Some of his best known subjects were drawn from the world of Italian comedy and ballet. Early life and training Jean-Antoine Watteau was born in October 1684 in Valenciennes, once an important town in the County of Hainaut which became sequently part of the Burgundian and Habsburg Netherlands until its secession to France following the Franco-Dutch War. He was the second of four sons born to Jean-Philippe Watteau (1660–1720) ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fête Galante
''Fête galante'' () (courtship party) is a category of painting specially created by the French Academy in 1717 to describe Antoine Watteau's (1684–1721) variations on the theme of the fête champêtre, which featured figures in ball dress or masquerade costumes disporting themselves amorously in parkland settings. When Watteau applied to join the French academy in 1717, there was no suitable category for his works, so the academy simply created one rather than reject his application. His reception piece was the ''Embarkation for Cythera'', now in the Louvre.Clarke, M. & D. (2010) "fête galante" in ''The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Art Terms''. oxfordreference.com, Oxford University Press. Retrieved 8 November 2013. ''Glossary'', |
François Lesure
François Lesure (23 May 1923 in Paris – 21 June 2001) was a French librarian and musicologist. Biography François Lesure studied at the Sorbonne, the École nationale des chartes (graduated in 1950), the École pratique des hautes études (graduated in 1948) and the Conservatoire de Paris. In 1950, he became curator in the music department of the Bibliothèque nationale de France, which he directed from 1970 to 1988. Between 1964 and 1977, he was appointed professor of musicology at the Université libre de Bruxelles. He succeeded Solange Corbin to the chair of musicology at the École pratique des Hautes Études in 1973. François Lesure organized major exhibitions at the Bibliothèque nationale and the Opéra de Paris (Mozart in 1956, Debussy in 1962, Berlioz in 1969, ''Deux siècles d'opéra français'' in 1972) and at the Villa Médicis in Rome (''Debussy et le symbolisme'' in 1984). He is mainly remembered as a specialist in 16th-century music, music sociology, mu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Roy Howat
Roy Howat (born 1951, Ayrshire, Scotland) is a Scottish pianist and musicologist, who specializes in French music. Howat has been Keyboard Research Fellow at the Royal Academy of Music in London since 2003, and Research Fellow at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland since 2013. Personal life Howat's mother was Czech, his father Scots. He was educated at Ardrossan Academy in Ayrshire and King's College, Cambridge, where he graduated with a first-class degree in Music in 1974. He has also studied under Vlado Perlemuter in Paris. He is married to the Australian pianist and musical writer Emily Kilpatrick. Publications He is one of the founding editors, with Pierre Boulez, François Lesure and others, of the Paris-based Complete Debussy Edition (''Œuvres Complètes de Claude Debussy''), for which he has edited much of the piano music. His other publications include the books, ''Debussy in Proportion'' and ''The Art of French piano music'', Urtext volumes of Chabrier and Fauré, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Édouard Colonne
Édouard Juda Colonne (23 July 1838 – 28 March 1910) was a French conductor and violinist, who was a champion of the music of Berlioz and other eminent 19th-century composers. Life and career Colonne was born in Bordeaux, the son and grandson of musicians of Italian-Jewish descent. From the age of eight, he played flageolet and accordion, and then began violin studies with Baudoin.''Cinquante Ans de Musique Française de 1874 à 1925.'' Les Éditions Musicales de la Librairie de France, Paris, 1925. Starting in 1855, Colonne studied at the Conservatoire in Paris, where he won first prizes in both harmony and violin. For almost a decade (1858–67) he was first violinist at the Opéra in Paris, as well as playing second violin in the Lamoureux Quartet. In 1871 he directed concerts at the Grand-Hôtel and Massenet's music for the staging of ''Les Érinnyes'' in 1873. Also in 1873, Colonne, along with the music publisher Georges Hartmann, founded the "Concert National" at th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Diminuendo
In music, the dynamics of a piece is the variation in loudness between notes or phrases. Dynamics are indicated by specific musical notation, often in some detail. However, dynamics markings still require interpretation by the performer depending on the musical context: for instance, the ''forte'' marking (meaning loud) in one part of a piece might have quite different objective loudness in another piece or even a different section of the same piece. The execution of dynamics also extends beyond loudness to include changes in timbre and sometimes tempo rubato. Purpose and interpretation Dynamics are one of the expressive elements of music. Used effectively, dynamics help musicians sustain variety and interest in a musical performance, and communicate a particular emotional state or feeling. Dynamic markings are always relative. never indicates a precise level of loudness; it merely indicates that music in a passage so marked should be considerably quieter than . There are m ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
