Camille Saint-Saëns
A Life
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- 19,99 €
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- 19,99 €
Descrição da editora
Camille Saint-Saëns began as a child prodigy and was acclaimed in his lifetime as the incarnation of French genius. His was one of the longest careers in musical history, stretching from the traditions of Beethoven to the innovations of the twentieth century, including one of the earliest film scores. As a virtuoso pianist he achieved international fame, while Liszt proclaimed him the world's greatest organist.
A prolific composer, there is much more to him than his best-known work, the witty Carnival of the Animals, of which he forbade performances in his lifetime. Among his most notable achievements are the opera Samson et Delila and the Organ Symphony, while the Danse Macabre, second piano concerto and first cello concerto remain much loved.
As a young man, he supported the 'new music' of Liszt, Wagner and Berlioz and introduced the symphonic poem into French music. He championed an up-and-coming generation of French composers, most notably Fauré, and played a unique part in transforming French taste from grand opera and operetta to the classical forms of symphony and chamber music, at the same time reviving interest in the music of Bach and Rameau.
His personal life was combative, tragic and surrounded by rumour: as a boy during the Revolution of 1848, serving as a National Guard in the war of 1870, and eventually becoming something of an icon of the Third Republic, used in diplomacy as a symbol of French culture.
This fascinating book (Chatto & Windus 1999) places his long and controversial career in a turbulent period when music, no less than politics, was undergoing sensational and often stormy change.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
For those who associate Saint-Sa ns (1835-1921) with only his most familiar pieces (Carnival of the Animals, Danse Macabre and the opera Samson and Delila), this book will come as a revelation. Rees (A Musical Peacemaker: The Life and Work of Sir Edward German) reinstates Saint-Sa ns as a major force in 19th-century French music. The composer was a child prodigy who wrote his own compositions before he was five, made his debut as a pianist at 10 and produced a multitude of operas, symphonies, concertos, orchestral pieces, and choral and chamber works. Saint-Sa ns was acclaimed by many for his genius, reviled by others as a dull conservative who revered out-of-favor composers such as Handel, Gluck, Bach and Mozart and cultivated older styles, such as the symphony and the concerto. Fierce in his opposition to contemporaries he disapproved of, including Franck, Debussy and Massenet, he showed exceptional generosity toward those he championed, Faur , Liszt and Gounod among them. Saint-Sa ns traveled all over the world and indulged his diverse interests as poet, philosopher, critic, journalist, amateur astronomer, even defender of animals. Adroitly balancing varying opinions about Saint-Sa ns's life and work, Rees presents an even-handed assessment of his achievements, examining the music in detail and demonstrating that it is imbued with individuality--innovative harmonies, stunning orchestral effects, ravishing melodies and exotic sounds and rhythms derived from the composer's world travels. This lucid and thorough biography should go a long way toward reviving interest in Saint-Sa ns. Illus.