1st Edition
The Correspondence of Camille Saint-Saëns and Gabriel Fauré Sixty Years of Friendship
This English edition of Jean-Michel Nectoux’s collection of the complete correspondence of Saint-Saëns and Fauré features some 130 letters spanning the period from 1862 to 1920. Immensely significant to the study of French music, these letters throw light upon one of the longest-surviving friendships between two composers in the history of music. They also contain frank exchanges of views on such topics as the music of Wagner, Berlioz, Debussy, Franck and others; the state of musical education in France; and other important artistic figures of fin de siècle Paris including Puvis de Chavannes, Rodin and Fremiet. Barrie Jones’s skilful translation of this important body of correspondence captures the often playful, casual, but always stimulating language of both composers. These letters are frequently the sole source for dating certain compositions or discovering projects that were started but then abandoned. They constitute a primary source for appreciation of Saint-Saëns’s and Fauré’s compositions, opinions and working practices.
Biography
Jean-Michel Nectoux was born at Raincy in 1946. He was appointed Curator of the music collection at the Bibliothèque nationale in Paris in 1972, and is now working at the Musée d'Orsay. J. Barrie Jones retired in 2003 from the Open University, where he has since 1972 been Research Assistant, Research Fellow and Lecturer in Music. He is the author of A Life in Letters (Batsford, 1989), a selection of over 300 letters from and to Fauré, and numerous articles on Romantic music.
'... Nectoux's essays on the long relationship between the two composers, especially intriguing in the way it charts the mutual admiration of each other's music...' Classical Music '... this slim, beautifully rendered book...' The New Criterion 'This English translation of Jean-Michel Nectoux's edition of the complete correspondence of Saint-Saëns and Fauré is most welcome... correspondence that reads well in English and can certainly be recommended for library shelves...' Music and Letters
