Camille Saint-Saëns

A leading figure of French Romanticism, Camille Saint-Saëns reigned over musical life as pianist, organist, conductor and pedagogue, penning works of every shape and form, from the amusing Carnival of the Animals to the opera Samson et Dalila. Born in Paris on October 9, 1835, he studied piano with his great-aunt, then with composer Camille-Marie Stamaty (a pupil of Mendelssohn), before switching to composition with Pierre Maleden. A prodigious pianist, he composed his first melody at the age of five and gave his first concert at Salle Pleyel on May 6, 1846, at the age of ten. Two years later, he entered the Paris Conservatoire, studying organ with François Benoist, composition with Jacques-Fromental Halévy and taking advice from Charles Gounod. Although he was unsuccessful in the Prix de Rome competition, the young Saint-Saëns went on to win first prize for organ in 1851, and a composition prize at the Sainte-Cécile competition in Bordeaux the following year with his cantata Ode à Sainte-Cécile. The same year he was appointed titular organist at Saint-Merri church, in 1853, he unveiled his First Symphony, which delighted Liszt and Berlioz. Four years later, in 1857, he succeeded Lefébure-Wély at the Madeleine church, officiating on the Cavaillé-Coll organ for twenty years and impressing audiences with his improvisations. In addition to his Premier Concerto pour piano (1858), this period saw him working on editions of works by Gluck, Mozart, Beethoven and Liszt, and defending Wagner against skeptics. A teacher at the École Niedermeyer from 1861 to 1865, his pupils included Gabriel Fauré and André Messager. In 1863, after writing a violin concerto for the virtuoso Pablo de Sarasate, he dedicated to him Introduction et Rondo capriccioso in A minor, which became one of his most popular pieces. After failing again at the Prix de Rome, his cantata Les Noces de Prométhée won a competition at the 1867 Universal Exhibition, before a jury including Rossini, Berlioz, Verdi, Gounod and Auber. The following year, he composed a second Piano Concerto at the request of Anton Rubinstein, then a third dedicated to Elie Miriam Delaborde, premiered in Leipzig in 1869. Enlisted in the Garde nationale during the Franco-Prussian war of 1870-1871, Saint-Saëns left for London to join Gounod and Pauline Viardot during the Commune, and studied Handel's scores at the Buckingham library. Back in Paris, he founded the Société national de musique on February 25, 1871, to promote the works of his peers, notably Franck, Fauré and Lalo, then Chabrier, Dukas, Debussy and Ravel, against the galloping Germanism of the concert societies. After the failure of his first opera La Princesse jaune (1872), Saint-Saëns spent some time in Algiers, and in 1875 married Marie-Laure Truffot, twenty-one years his junior, who gave him two sons, one who died falling from a balcony at the age of two, the other of pneumonia. Although they did not divorce, the couple did not survive and soon separated. Invited to St. Petersburg, the composer presented his famous Danse macabre in 1875, the successor to the symphonic poems Le Rouet d'Omphale and Phaéton. In February 1877, his second opera , Le Timbre d'argent, premiered in Paris, while the more acclaimed Samson et Dalila, with its Wagnerian influence, was presented in Weimar on December 2. Other compositions also saw the light of day in the same period: the oratorio Le Déluge (1875), the Requiem (1878), the Piano Quartet (1875) and the symphonic poem La Jeunesse d'Hercule (1877). After performing for Queen Victoria at Windsor in 1880, the decade saw him elected to the Académie des Beaux-Arts in 1881 and promoted to Officier de la Légion d'Honneur in 1884 (he became Grand-Croix in 1913). 1886 saw the release of two major symphonic works: the great Symphony no. 3 with organ, dedicated to Liszt and premiered in London, and the famous Carnaval des animaux, premiered by cellist Charles Lebouc on March 9. What was intended as a private musical joke, whose author forbade any public performance, was transformed against his will into a classical music "hit", culminating in Le Cygne, the only piece he allowed to be broadcast. As a result, several of his works followed in quick succession: Étienne Marcel (1879), Henry VIII (1883), Proserpine (1887), Ascanio (1890), Phryné (1893), Frédégonde (1895), Les Barbares (1901), Hélène (1904) and L'Ancêtre (1906). Only Déjanire, a stage musical premiered in Béziers in 1898 and adapted as a lyric drama in Monte-Carlo in 1911, left a lasting impression. From 1857 to 1921, Saint-Saëns devoted much of his time to travel, making 179 visits to 27 countries in Europe, Asia, South America and above all North Africa. He brought back with him the Piano Concerto No. 5, known as "l'Égyptien", premiered at Pleyel on May 6, 1896, with its second movement featuring a Nubian melody heard while sailing on the Nile. Settled in Dieppe, where a museum in his name was created in 1890, the composer continued to write articles and worked from 1895 to 1918 on the edition of Jean-Philippe Rameau's complete works, with Charles Bordes and Vincent d'Indy. Appointed honorary doctor by the universities of Cambridge and Oxford, he presented his cantata Le Feu céleste, dedicated to the "Electricity Fairy", at the 1900 Universal Exhibition. Elected President of the Académie des Beaux-Arts in 1901, he wrote the first film score for André Calmettes and Charles Le Bargy's L'Assassinat du Duc de Guise (1908), as well as three incidental scores: Antigone (1894), Parysatis (1902) and Andromaque (1903), commissioned by Sarah Bernhardt. In 1906, he toured the United States for the first time, returning in 1915. Remaining in the post-romantic era, Saint-Saëns belonged to a bygone era in the age of modernism. The man who had occupied the forefront of the musical scene for eight decades gave a final concert at the Casino de Dieppe under his 75 years as a pianist, then left for Algiers, where he died on December 16, 1921 at the age of 86. His body was repatriated to Paris for a state funeral at the Madeleine church.

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