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Gabriel Fauré, in full Gabriel-Urbain Fauré (b. May 12, 1845, d. Nov. 4, 1924, Paris), composer whose refined and gentle music influenced the course of modern French music.
Faure\'s musical abilities became apparent at an early age. When the Swiss composer and teacher Louis Niedermeyer heard the boy, he immediately accepted him as a pupil. Faure studied piano with Camille Saint-Saens, who introduced him to the music of Franz Liszt and Richard Wagner. While still a student, Faure published his first composition, a work for piano, Trois romances sans paroles (1863). In 1896 he was appointed church organist at the church of La Madeleine in Paris and professor of composition at the Paris Conservatory. In 1905 he succeeded Theodore Dubois as director of the conservatory, and he remained in office until ill health and deafness forced him to resign in 1920. Among his students were Maurice Ravel, Georges Enesco, and Nadia Boulanger.
Faure excelled not only as a songwriter of great refinement and sensitivity but also as a composer in every branch of chamber music. He enriched the literature of the piano with a number of highly original and exquisitely wrought works, of which his 13 nocturnes, 13 barcaroles, and 5 impromptus are perhaps the most representative and best known. Fauré\'s Ballade for piano and orchestra (1881; originally arranged for solo piano, 1877-79), two sonatas for violin and piano, and Berceuse for violin and piano (1880) are among other popular works. Elegie for cello and piano (1880; arranged for orchestra, 1896), and two sonatas for cello and piano, as well as chamber pieces, are frequently performed and recorded.
Among his few works written for the orchestra alone is Masques et bergamasques (1919). The Messe de requiem for solo voices, chorus, orchestra, and organ (1887) did not gain immediate popularity, but it has since become one of Faure\'s most frequently performed works.
Although he had deep respect for the traditional forms of music, Faure delighted in infusing those forms with a melange of harmonic daring and a freshness of invention. One of the most striking features of his style was his fondness for daring harmonic progressions and sudden modulations, invariably carried out with supreme elegance and a deceptive air of simplicity. His quiet and unspectacular revolution prepared the way for more sensational innovations by the modern French school. |