| Information: |
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Charles-Camille Saint-Saens (9 October 1835-16 December 1921) was a French late-romantic composer, organist, conductor, and pianist. He is known especially for The Carnival of the Animals, Danse macabre, Samson and Delilah, Piano Concerto No. 2, Cello Concerto No. 1, Havanaise, Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, and his Symphony No. 3 (Organ Symphony).
Saint-Saens was born in Paris, France on 9 October 1835. His father, a government clerk, died three months after his birth. He was raised by his mother, Clemence, with the assistance of her aunt, Charlotte Masson, who moved in. Masson introduced Saint-Saens to the piano, and began giving him lessons on the instrument. At about this time, age two, Saint-Saenns was found to possess perfect pitch. His first composition, a little piece for the piano dated 22 March 1839, is now kept in the Bibliotheque nationale de France. Saint-Saens\\\\\\\'s precocity was not limited to music. He learned to read and write by age three, and had some mastery of Latin by the age of seven. His first public concert appearance occurred when he was five years old, when he accompanied a Beethoven violin sonata. He went on to begin in-depth study of the full score of Don Giovanni. In 1842, Saint-Saens began piano lessons with Camille-Marie Stamaty, a pupil of Friedrich Kalkbrenner, who had his students play the piano while resting their forearms on a bar situated in front of the keyboard, so that all the pianist\\\\\\\'s power came from the hands and fingers but not the arms. At ten years of age,
He then studied composition under Fromental Halevy at the Conservatoire de Paris. Saint-Saens won many top prizes and gained a reputation that resulted in his introduction to Franz Liszt, who would become one of his closest friends. At the age of sixteen, Saint-Saens wrote his first symphony; his second, published as Symphony No. 1 in E-flat major, was performed in 1853 to the astonishment of many critics and fellow composers.
For income, Saint-Saens played the organ at various churches in Paris, with his first appointment being at the Saint-Merri in the Beaubourg area. In 1857, he replaced Lefebure-Wely at the eminent position of organist at the Egglise de la Madeleine, which he kept until 1877. From 1861 to 1865, Saint-Saens held his only teaching position as professor of piano at the Ecole Niedermeyer, where he raised eyebrows by including contemporary musiciens Liszt, Gounod, Schumann, Berlioz, and Wagner along with the school\\\\\\\'s otherwise conservative curriculum of Bach and Mozart. Saint-Saens was a multi-faceted intellectual. From an early age, he studied geology, archaeology, botany, and lepidoptery. He was an expert at mathematics.
In 1870, the Franco-Prussian War, despite being over in barely six months, left an indelible mark on the composer. He was relieved from fighting duty as one of the favourites of a relative of emperor Napoleon III, but fled nonetheless to London for several months when the Paris Commune broke out in the besieged Paris of winter 1871, his fame and societal status posing a threat to his survival. In the same year, he co-founded with Romain Bussine the Societe Nationale de Musique in order to promote a new and specifically French music.
In 1875, nearing forty, Saint-Saenns married Marie Laure Emile Truffot, who was just 19. They had two sons, both of whom died in 1878, within six weeks of each other, one from an illness, the other upon falling out of a fourth-story window.
In 1886 Saint-Saenns debuted two of his most renowned compositions: The Carnival of the Animals and Symphony No. 3, dedicated to Franz Liszt, who died that year. That same year, however, Vincent d\\\\\\\'Indy and his allies had Saint-Saens removed from the Societe Nationale de Musique. Two years later, Saint-Saens\\\\\\\'s mother died, driving the mourning composer away from France to the Canary Islands under the alias \\\\\\\"Sannois\\\\\\\". Over the next several years he travelled around the world, visiting exotic locations in Europe, North Africa, Southeast Asia, and South America. Saint-Saens chronicled his travels in many popular books using his nom de plume, Sannois.
In recognition of his accomplishments, the government of France awarded him the Grand Cross of the Legion d\\\\\\\'honneur. A street in Paris and in Marseilles is named in his honor.
Saint-Saens died of pneumonia on 16 December 1921 at the Hotel de l\\\\\\\'Oasis in Algiers. |