Gabriel Fauré

Gabriel Fauré (1845-1924), French composer and organist, born in Pamiers. He studied music at the École Niedermeyer, Paris, under the noted French composer Camille Saint-Saëns. From 1866 to 1905 Fauré was organist in a number of churches, including the churches of St Sulpice and the Madeleine in Paris. In 1896 he became professor of composition at the Paris Conservatoire and from 1905 to 1920 was its director. Among his students were the French musicians Nadia Boulanger and Maurice Ravel and the Romanian composer Georges Enesco.

Along with Saint-Saëns, Fauré was instrumental in keeping French musical values alive at a time when the tendency throughout Europe was to adopt the goals and techniques of German Romantic music. Fauré preferred a discreet emotional range, rather than the sometimes flamboyant expression of Wagner and his followers. He composed within the smaller genres, especially songs and short piano pieces. He valued musical logic and never allowed literary or philosophical associations to rule over or interfere with the smooth flow of his music. Fauré's works include the Ballade for Piano and Orchestra (1881), the suite Pelléas et Mélisande, the Requiem Mass (1887), the song cycles La bonne chanson (The Good Song, 1891-92) and L'horizon chimérique (Fantastic Horizon, 1922), the opera Pénélope (1913), and much piano and chamber music.