Gabriel Urbain Faure
1845 - 1924
Gabriel Faure Early
Years
• Gabriel Urbain Fauré was born in Pamiers, Ariège,
Midi-Pyrénées, to Toussaint-Honoré Fauré and
Marie-Antoinette-Hélène Lalène-Laprade.
• He was the 5th of 6 children
• Fauré was sent to live with a foster-nurse for four
years.
• From the time he was 9 until he was 20 he studied at
Ecole Niedermeyer Conservatory in Paris which
specialized in religious music and organ studies.
GABRIEL FAURE EARLY
YEARS
•Faure was one of its first students at the
conservatory.
•He studied under Camille Saint-Saëns and Ecole
Niedermeyer.
•Camille Saint-Saëns was the one who introduced
Faure to contemporary music.
Gabriel Faure
• After he left school he became the chief organist at
the Church of Saint-Sauveurthe. Four years later he
got the post of assistant organist at the church of
Notre-Dame de Clignancourt.
• He was there for only a few months because of the
outbreak of the Franco-Prussain War in 1870, he
volunteered for military service. He was part of the
action in the Siege ofParise and saw action at Le
Bourget, Champingy and Creteil.
Gabriel Faure
• In Switzerland he taught at the transported École
Niedermeyer.
• When he returned to Paris in October 1871, he was
assistant organist at Saint-Sulpice as an accompanist to
the choir.
• In 1874, Fauré stopped working at Saint-Sulpice and
began to fill in at the Église de la Madeleine for SaintSaëns.
• In 1877, Saint-Saëns retired and Fauré became
choirmaster.
Gabriel Faure
• He succeeded in gaining new jobs after the teachers
retired and taught many subjects.
• Eventually in 1905 he became the director of the
Paris Conservatoire.
• In 1920 he retired and wrote music until his death in
1924 from pneumonia
• He was given a state funeral at the Église de la
Madeleine and is buried in the Cimetière de Passy in
Paris.
Gabriel Faure Marriage
• In 1877 he was engaged to Marianne Viardot until
she broke it off leaving him heartbroken.
• In 1883, He married Marie Frement and they had
two kids.
• In his marriage he frequently had
affairs, including one with Emma
Bardac who was to become Claude
Debussy second wife.
Gabriel Faure Facts
• He formed the Societe Nationale Musique.
• He taught many people who became
composers.
• In 1865, when he was still in school, Faure
wrote his first piece ‘Canitque de Jean Racine’
and won first place for an award.
• It wasn’t until the end of his life when his
music got famous.
Gabriel Faure
• Fauré avoids standard harmonies
• Faureis said to be one of the foremost French
composers of his generation, and his musical
style influenced many 20th century
composers.
GABRIEL FAURE TYPES OF WORKS
•Stage Works
•Orchestral Music
•Vocal
•Chamber
•Church music
•Piano music
Gabriel Faure Famous for:
His most famous pieces are
• Song “Aprex un reve”
• Song “Clair de lune”
• Requiem
Requiem
Requiem
• Faure started writing Requiem in 1887
• The version of the song today is not the original
that was made in 1887.
• The original contain only:
Introit and Kyrie
Sanctus
Pie Jesu
Agnus Dei
In Paradisum
Requiem
• The first performance was on January 16,
1888 in La Madeleine in Paris.
• He in 1889 added an Offertoire, and added a
setting of the Libera Me.
• The first performance of the new version was
on January of 1893 in the Madeleine.
Requiem
• Unlike other Requiems Gabriel Faure’s
Requiem was not made composed due to a
death and many people have questioned his
Requiem because it was so unusual.
• Gabriel Faure wrote a fellow conductor
Maurice Emmanuel who had asked about
Requiem. This is his letter:
Libera Me
Free me, Lord,
from eternal death,
on that day of dread,
when the heavens and earth shall move,
when you shall come to judge the world by fire.
I am made to tremble, and to fear,
when destruction shall come,
and also your coming wrath.
O that day, that day of wrath,
of calamity and misery,
the great and exceedingly bitter day.
Grant eternal rest to them, Lord,
and let perpetual light shine on them.
Letter to Maurice Emmanuel
Dear sir and friend,
My requiem was composed just so... as a joke, if I may
express myself thus! It was performed for the first time
in La Madeleine for the funeral of some or the other
parisher around 1890. I cannot tell you any more!
Sincerely,
Gabriel Fauré
If my memory does not fail me the deceased of 1890
was a M. le Soufaché, which is not at all an ordinary
name!
Gabriel Faure said
"It has been said that my Requiem does not express the fear
of death and someone has called it a lullaby of death. But it is
thus that I see death: as a happy deliverance, an aspiration
towards happiness above, rather than as a painful experience.
The music of Gounod has been criticized for its overinclination
towards human tenderness. But his nature predisposed him
to feel this way: religious emotion took this form inside him. Is
it not necessary to accept the artist's nature? As to my
Requiem, perhaps I have also instinctively sought to escape
from what is thought right and proper, after all the years of
accompanying burial services on the organ! I know it all by
heart. I wanted to write something different."
Gabriel Faure
• It want until later in life when his music got
the noticed it deserved.
• As he grew older Faure discovered that he was
going deaf but it didn’t stop him and he
continue to write music.
• He retired in 1920 and died in 1924 from
pneumonia.
Sources
• http://noteworthy.zasu.us/composers/Faure/
Gabriel_Faure_1864.jpg
• http://sws1.bu.edu/skocpol/Blanche/faure.jpg
• http://www.musicscores.com/graphics/fa_48_4_vo.gif
• http://www.classicalcomposers.org/comp/faure
Sources Continue
• http://www.classiccat.net/faure_g/biography.
php#Early_years
• http://www.classical.net/music/comp.lst/faur
e.php
• http://www.naxos.com/person/Gabriel_Faure
/26049.htm
• http://members.macconnect.com/users/j/jim
bob/classical/Faure_Requiem.html