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André Messager
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André Charles Prosper Messager (December 30, 1853 - February 24, 1929), French composer and musician, was born at Montluçon.
é Messager was the son of Paul-Philippe-Émile Messager (a local tax collector) and Sophie-Cornélie Lhôte de Selancy. It was not a musical household but the young boy had his first musical exposure on a piano in the house. At the age of seven he was sent as a boarder to a Marist school where he continued his interest in the piano.
A bank crash brought ruin to the family and Messager left the Marist school to become an organist.
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Encyclopedia
André Charles Prosper Messager (December 30, 1853 - February 24, 1929), French composer and musician, was born at Montluçon.
Early years
André Messager was the son of Paul-Philippe-Émile Messager (a local tax collector) and Sophie-Cornélie Lhôte de Selancy. It was not a musical household but the young boy had his first musical exposure on a piano in the house. At the age of seven he was sent as a boarder to a Marist school where he continued his interest in the piano.
A bank crash brought ruin to the family and Messager left the Marist school to become an organist. He studied at the École Niedermeyer with Eugène Gigout and Gabriel Fauré as his teachers, and was for some time a pupil of Saint-Saëns. He collaborated with Fauré on the Messe des pêcheurs de Villerville. In 1874 Messager was appointed organist at Saint-Sulpice. In 1876, he won the gold medal of the Société des Compositeurs with a symphony, and began his career composing for the stage at the Folies Bergère in the 1870s, leaving there at the end of that decade to conduct for a season at the Eden Théâtre in Brussels. In 1880 he was appointed music director at Ste Marie-des-Batignolles, and it is also from around this time that he became interested in the music of Wagner.
Career
His break came in 1883, when the composer Firmin Bernicat died leaving an operetta incomplete; Messager finished it, and on 8 November 1883 Francois-les-bas-bleus was mounted with success at the Folies-Dramatiques. This led to the commission of La fauvette du Temple, first performed on 17 November 1884 which confirmed Messager's reputation as an operetta composer. 1883 also saw Messager give the first performance with Chabrier, on 15 December at the Société National de Musique, of the older composer's Trois valses romantiques (the concert also included the two-piano version premiere of España). A close friend of Chabrier from the 1880s until Chabrier's death, he had a huge admiration for Gwendoline and swore that he would conduct it in Paris - which he did on 12 May 1911.
Messager composed 45 works for the stage, of which eight were ballets. He also composed a symphony in 1875 and numerous songs and instrumental works. In 1885 he produced his operetta La Béarnaise, performed in London in 1886. His ballet Les Deux pigeons was produced at the Paris Opera in 1886, and the success of this was followed by instrumental works, along with a serious opera Le bourgeois de Calais.
Messager's comic opera La Basoche was produced in 1890 at the Opéra Comique in Paris (an English version was produced in London in 1891 by Richard D'Oyly Carte) and consolidated his reputation. Subsequently, this was increased by such tuneful and tasteful operettas as Madame Chrysanthème (1893), Mirette (1894, produced by Carte at the Savoy Theatre), the successful Les p'tites Michu (1897, which had a run of 401 performances at Daly's Theatre in London eight years later in 1905-06), and Véronique (1898), Messager's most successful comic opera in England. Véronique enjoyed a run of 496 performances in the West End six years after its Paris opening, in 1904-05.
A lull in Messager's career after the lack of success of Madame Chrysanthème and Le chevalier d'Harmental led the composer to settle in Maidenhead, England, with his second wife Alice Maude Davis (the composer Hope Temple) - the exile coming to an end with the success of Les p'tites Michu.
From 1897 to 1904 Messager was musical director of the Opéra-Comique, conducting the premiere of Charpentier's Louise in 1900 and Debussy's Pelléas et Mélisande in 1902. Messager also conducted in London from 1901-1907, and was one of the directors of Covent Garden opera, and returned to direct the Opéra-Comique again in the 1919-20 season, where he conducted the first complete French version of Cosi fan tutte. Messager was the conductor for Tristan und Isolde at the Opéra on the 100th anniversary of Wagner's birth.
During the First World War, Messager toured to Switzerland and Argentina, conducting Ninon Vallin at the Teatro Colón.
Monsieur Beaucaire (1919), Messager's second English-language operetta, ran for 400 performances in London and was toured internationally. It is still performed regularly in translation in France. Other Messager operas included Fortunio (1907), L'amour masqué (1923), and Passionement (1928).
He collaborated with Yvonne Printemps and Sacha Guitry in the 1920s: Deburau and L'amour masqué. In 1924 Diaghilev persuaded Messager to conduct the Paris premieres of Auric's ballet Les Fâcheux and Poulenc's Les Biches.
A serious illness had led to his being reported dead in 1921; Messager died in 1929 and was interred in the Passy Cemetery.
Honours and awards
He was elected President of the Société des Auteurs et Compositeurs Dramatiques in 1926 and was made a Commandeur of the Légion d'honneur in 1927.
Works
- François les bas-bleus (1883)
- La fauvette du temple (1885)
- Le bourgeois de Calais (1887)
- Isoline (1888)
- La basoche (1890)
- Madame Chrysanthème (1893)
- Mirette (1894)
- Les p'tites Michu (1897)
- Véronique (1898)
- Fortunio (1907)
- Béatrice (1914)
- Monsieur Beaucaire (1919)
- La petite fonctionnaire (1921)
- L'amour masque (1923)
- Passionément (1926)
- Sacha (1930)
Recordings
His recordings (as conductor) include the Prelude to Le Déluge by Saint-Saëns (recorded November 1918 with Alfred Brun as soloist) and Les Chasseresses and Cortège de Bacchus from Sylvia by Delibes (also November 1918) with the Paris Conservatoire Orchestra.
External links
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