Jean-Michel Nectoux's important new biography of Gabriel Faure is the most comprehensive study yet of this central figure of fin de siecle France. It traces the composer's life and the rich cultural milieu in which he lived and worked: the world also of Saint-Saens, Flaubert, Verlaine, Ravel, Debussy and Proust. A large part of the book considers Faure's music, with particular emphasis on his adjustment to the musical language of the twentieth century and the formation of his late style. Works in all genres are discussed in detail. The book is the fruit of over twenty years' research by...
Jean-Michel Nectoux's important new biography of Gabriel Faure is the most comprehensive study yet of this central figure of fin de siecle France. It ...
Letter writing, by contrast, provided him with a freer outlet for creative expression, and his surviving correspondences number in the thousands. From that extraordinary output Hugh Macdonald has gathered some 500 letters that span the composer's life and chart the course of his artistic career. The first letter, written by a brash fifteen-year-old Berlioz to a group of music publishers, suggests that they bring out his work at their own expense. The last letter, in which Berlioz begs his brother-in-law for money, reveals the once-prodigious composer and writer reduced to a pathetic state...
Letter writing, by contrast, provided him with a freer outlet for creative expression, and his surviving correspondences number in the thousands. F...
Camille Saint-Saens is a memorable figure not only for his successes as a composer of choral and orchestral works, and the eternally popular opera Samson et Dalila, but also because he was a keen observer of the musical culture in which he lived. A composer of vast intelligence and erudition, Saint-Saens was at the same time one of the foremost writers on music in his day. From Wagner, Liszt and Debussy to Milhaud and Stravinsky, Saint-Saens was at the center of the elite musical and cultural fin de siecle and early 20th Century world. He championed Schumann and Wagner in...
Camille Saint-Saens is a memorable figure not only for his successes as a composer of choral and orchestral works, and the eternally popular opera
