Napoléon Alexandre Alkan, born Napoléon Alexandre Morhange (2 February 1826 – August 1906), was a French composer and music teacher.
Career
Alkan was born in Paris, one of six children of Alkan Morhange and Julie Abraham. The family was Jewish, and Alkan Morhange ran a successful music school. All of the Morhange children adopted their father's name as their surname, and all successfully attended the
Conservatoire de Paris
The Conservatoire de Paris (), also known as the Paris Conservatory, is a college of music and dance founded in 1795. Officially known as the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris (CNSMDP), it is situated in the avenue ...
.
Céleste Alkan
Céleste Alkan (born Céleste Morhange, after marriage Céleste Marix) (25 February 1812 – 25 December 1897), was a French musician, the sister of the pianist and composer Charles-Valentin Alkan and the music professor Napoléon Alkan.
Life
Sh ...
(married surname Mayer-Marix) (25 February 1811 – 1891) began her training at the Conservatoire at the age of seven and won
first prize in solfège at the age of eleven.
Charles-Valentin Alkan
Charles-Valentin Alkan (; 30 November 1813 – 29 March 1888) was a French Jewish composer and virtuoso pianist. At the height of his fame in the 1830s and 1840s he was, alongside his friends and colleagues Frédéric Chopin and Franz Lisz ...
(1813–1888), the most distinguished of the siblings, became a well-known composer and piano virtuoso. Ernest Alkan (11 July 1816 – 1876) was a student of
Jean-Louis Tulou and became known as a flutist. Maxime Alkan (28 May 1818 – 1891) wrote popular music including dances for piano. The youngest of the siblings was Gustave Alkan (24 March 1827 – 1882).
Napoléon became a student at the Conservatoire in 1835 where he studied piano with
Pierre Zimmermann, organ with
François Benoist and
counterpoint
In music, counterpoint is the relationship between two or more musical lines (or voices) which are harmonically interdependent yet independent in rhythm and melodic contour. It has been most commonly identified in the European classical tradi ...
and
fugue
In music, a fugue () is a contrapuntal compositional technique in two or more voices, built on a subject (a musical theme) that is introduced at the beginning in imitation (repetition at different pitches) and which recurs frequently in the c ...
with
Adolphe Adam
Adolphe Charles Adam (; 24 July 1803 – 3 May 1856) was a French composer, teacher and music critic. A prolific composer for the theatre, he is best known today for his ballets ''Giselle'' (1841) and '' Le corsaire'' (1856), his operas ''Le pos ...
. In 1843 he won first prize for piano at the Conservatoire. From 1845 he taught at the Conservatoire as a repetiteur for
solfège
In music, solfège (, ) or solfeggio (; ), also called sol-fa, solfa, solfeo, among many names, is a music education method used to teach aural skills, Pitch (music), pitch and sight-reading of Western classical music, Western music. Solfège is ...
. In 1850 he won the Second Grand Prix in the
Prix de Rome
The Prix de Rome () or Grand Prix de Rome was a French scholarship for arts students, initially for painters and sculptors, that was established in 1663 during the reign of Louis XIV of France. Winners were awarded a bursary that allowed them t ...
with the cantata ''Emma et Eginhard'' based on a poem by
Anne Bignan
Anne Bignan (1795–1861) was a French poet and translator, known for his translations of Homer
Homer (; grc, Ὅμηρος , ''Hómēros'') (born ) was a Greek poet who is credited as the author of the ''Iliad'' and the ''Odyssey'', two ...
.
In June 1857, he taught in the class of military students, then from April 1866 was tenured as associate professor of solfeggio.
[François-Sappey (2013), p. 140.] He retained this position until 1 October 1896, when he retired at the age of 70. In 1895 he was made a Chevalier of the
Légion d'honneur
The National Order of the Legion of Honour (french: Ordre national de la Légion d'honneur), formerly the Royal Order of the Legion of Honour ('), is the highest French order of merit, both military and civil. Established in 1802 by Napoleon ...
.
[Prix de Rome website]
"Napoléon MOHRANGE dit ALKAN (1826–1906)", accessed 10 May 2020). He died in Paris aged 80, leaving a daughter, Emma Liernut.
He composed a number of original piano works and piano transcriptions of works by classical composers such as Mozart and Haydn.
References
Bibliography
* Brigitte and François Luguenot François-Sappey: ''Charles-Valentin Alkan'' (Paris: Bleu Nuit, 2013); .
External links
on Prix de Rome 1850-1859
Napoléon Alkanon IMSLP
{{DEFAULTSORT:Alkan, Napoleon
1826 births
1906 deaths
19th-century classical composers
19th-century French composers
19th-century French male musicians
Conservatoire de Paris faculty
Chevaliers of the Légion d'honneur
Conservatoire de Paris alumni
French Ashkenazi Jews
French classical composers
French male classical composers
Jewish classical composers
Jewish classical pianists
Musicians from Paris