François Antoine Camille Durutte, comte Durutte (15 October 1803 – 24 September 1881), was a French composer and

music theorist Music theory is the study of the practices and possibilities of music. ''The Oxford Companion to Music'' describes three interrelated uses of the term "music theory". The first is the "rudiments", that are needed to understand music notation (ke ...

Life

Born in

Ypres Ypres ( , ; nl, Ieper ; vls, Yper; german: Ypern ) is a Belgian city and municipality in the province of West Flanders. Though the Dutch name is the official one, the city's French name is most commonly used in English. The municipality co ...

, the son of General

Pierre François Joseph Durutte Pierre François Joseph Durutte (13 July 1767 – 18 April 1827) joined the French army at the beginning of the French Revolutionary Wars. Rapidly promoted for feats of bravery under fire at Jemappes in 1792 and Hondschoote in 1793, he found h ...

, he was destined for a military career. He studied at the

Lycée Louis-le-Grand The Lycée Louis-le-Grand (), also referred to simply as Louis-le-Grand or by its acronym LLG, is a public Lycée (French secondary school, also known as sixth form college) located on rue Saint-Jacques in central Paris. It was founded in the ...

and then at the

École Polytechnique École may refer to: * an elementary school in the French educational stages normally followed by secondary education establishments (collège and lycée) * École (river), a tributary of the Seine flowing in région Île-de-France * École, Savoi ...

both in Paris from 1823 to 1825. It was only after the death of his father in 1827 that he turned to music. He conceived a mathematical

musical theory Music theory is the study of the practices and possibilities of music. ''The Oxford Companion to Music'' describes three interrelated uses of the term "music theory". The first is the "Elements of music, rudiments", that are needed to understand ...

based on the work of Josef Hoëné-Wronski and which he presented in his books ''Esthétique musical'' (1855) and ''Technie harmonique'' (1876). His theories were not very fruitful for musical practice and were only taken up in isolation, for example by

Edgar Varèse Edgar is a commonly used English given name, from an Anglo-Saxon name ''Eadgar'' (composed of ''wikt:en:ead, ead'' "rich, prosperous" and ''Gar (spear), gar'' "spear"). Like most Anglo-Saxon names, it fell out of use by the later medieval per ...

. Durutte also composed several operas,

religious music Religious music (also sacred music) is a type of music that is performed or composed for religious use or through religious influence. It may overlap with ritual music, which is music, sacred or not, performed or composed for or as ritual. Relig ...

and

chamber music Chamber music is a form of classical music that is composed for a small group of instruments—traditionally a group that could fit in a palace chamber or a large room. Most broadly, it includes any art music that is performed by a small numb ...

. Durutte died in Paris at age 77.

Works

* ''Esthétique musicale: Technie ou Lois générales du système harmonique''. 1855 * ''Résumé élémentaire de la Technie harmonique et complément de cette Technie''. 1876 * ''Réponse du comte Camille Durutte, d'Ypres, compositeur ... à la prétendue réfutation de son système harmonique, par M.F.-J. Fétis, ... : suivie de L'exposé du principe absolu du rhythme musical et de la sanction physiologique de ce principe.''''Réponse du comte Camille Durutte, d'Ypres, compositeur ... à la prétendue réfutation de son système harmonique, par M.F.-J. Fétis, ... : suivie de L'exposé du principe absolu du rhythme musical et de la sanction physiologique de ce principe.''
on WorldCat

Bibliography

* , « Notice sur le comte Durutte », dans ''Mémoires de l'Académie de Metz'' 1881–1882, 1885,
(read online)

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Durutte, Camille French music theorists French Romantic composers 1803 births 1881 deaths Musicians from Ypres 19th-century musicologists