Camille-Marie Stamaty
Encyclopedia
Camille-Marie Stamaty was a French pianist
, piano teacher and composer predominantly of piano music and studies (études). Today largely forgotten, he was one of the preeminent piano teachers in 19th century Paris. His most famous pupils were Louis Moreau Gottschalk
and Camille Saint-Saëns
.
Stamaty was the star pupil of Friedrich Kalkbrenner
and heir to Kalkbrenner's teaching method. He taught a crisp, fine, even filigree piano playing that concentrated on evenness of scales, independence of fingers and minimum movement of body and arms.
Stamaty composed a great number of piano studies (études), various other shorter piano works (the usual waltzes, fantasies, quadrilles, and variations so dear to the 19th century), a piano concerto
and some chamber music
. None of his music is still in the repertoire today, although a good look at his once famous études might be very worthwhile. New recordings of his best output (concert études, piano concerto), possibly on period instruments, would be desirable.
, was the son of a naturalized Greek father (hence the name) and a French mother. His father was for a time French consul in the Italian town of Civitavecchia
. His mother was French and according to Antoine François Marmontel
, who probably knew her, a fine singer of Italian operatic arias. Stamaty's father died in 1818, which forced the family to move back to France
, first to Dijon
, later on to Paris
.
Stamaty did become a civil servant but he did not give up on music altogether. In his spare time he kept practicing and composing and his playing must have been so good that he could perform at soirees in fashionable Parisian homes. This was no mean achievement as Paris was considered to be the city of pianists and Stamaty had ample competition in fashionable salons from luminaries such as Sigismond Thalberg
, Franz Liszt
, Stephen Heller
, Henri Herz
, Émile Prudent
and scores of lesser known piano players.
that decided Stamaty's fate. Kalkbrenner had been looking for a pupil who would continue his school for some time. He had considered Frédéric Chopin
, but Chopin on the advice of his teacher Józef Elsner
had turned him down. The same had happened with Charles Hallé
. Hallé too had at first sought out Kalkbrenner to become his pupil, but Kalkbrenner's stiff, old-fashioned and even flawed playing deterred Hallé so much, that he decided otherwise.
Stamaty in many ways was the ideal candidate for Kalkbrenner. He was talented, ambitious and in addition to that he was poor and bored at his job in the Préfecture. And above all he was prepared to suffer Kalkbrenner who had a reputation as a martinet. Marmontel shrewdly points out that, as Stamaty was no artist on the scale of Chopin and thus lacked the strong personality of the great genius, he was ideally suited for Kalkbrenner's strict regime.
So when Kalkbrenner heard Stamaty play a quadrille
with variations of his own composition he approached Stamaty and made him a business proposal: Stamaty would become his pupil and his répètiteur at the same time. A répètiteur was an auxiliary teacher to Kalkbrenner who in his later years did little teaching himself. Kalkbrenner gave fashionable and very expensive piano courses for selected pupils, while Stamaty would prepare students for these courses and do all the preparatory teaching.
and in harmony and counter-point from Anton Reicha
.
Finally, in October 1836 Stamaty went to Leipzig
to receive the finishing touches of his education from Felix Mendelssohn
. Mendelssohn writes about the lessons he gave Stamaty in a letter to Ferdinand Hiller
on October 29, 1836:
On November 26, 1836, Mendelssohn wrote some more about Stamaty to Hiller:
Stamaty figured also in a letter Mendelssohn’s sister Rebecca wrote to Karl Klingemann on October 4, 1836:
Apart from Louis Moreau Gottschalk
, Stamaty's most famous pupil was Camille Saint-Saëns
. Saint-Saëns started with Stamaty when he was seven years old (1842) and he stayed with him until he was fourteen (1849), whence he went on to the Paris
Conservatoire. Although Saint-Saëns in his later life was very critical, even dismissive of Stamaty's teaching, it is a fact that Saint-Saëns under Stamaty's tutelage developed into a first rate pianist who maintained the high level of his playing all his life, well into his eighties.
. Sometimes these illnesses lasted for up to half a year; during this time Stamaty was forced to give up all musical activities . When his mother died in 1846, Stamaty grieved so much that he left Paris to retreat to Rome for a full year.
Stamaty married in 1848 and became the father of four children. Marmontel points out that Stamaty was the most devoted of husbands and fathers.
Stamaty's piano technique was firmly rooted in the pre-Steinway area of those pianos built according the old system (wooden frame). Marmontel clearly states that Stamaty was a pianist of style but was no transcendental virtuoso and that his playing lacked warmth, colour and brilliance. Stamaty's method prescribed complete immobility of body and arms, elbows tucked into the body and all action of the muscles limited to finger and forearms. Saint-Saens who during his long life had witnessed the development from the old purely digital technique to the transcendental virtuosity of Franz Liszt
, Anton Rubinstein
and even Leopold Godowsky
sums up the advantages and the drawbacks of the Kalkbrenner-Stamaty school like this:
Stamaty’s studies are really not too different from the studies by Carl Czerny
. There are many similarities between Stamaty’s best output and Czerny’s more demanding studies such as his Études de Mécanisme op. 499.
Pianist
A pianist is a musician who plays the piano. A professional pianist can perform solo pieces, play with an ensemble or orchestra, or accompany one or more singers, solo instrumentalists, or other performers.-Choice of genres:...
, piano teacher and composer predominantly of piano music and studies (études). Today largely forgotten, he was one of the preeminent piano teachers in 19th century Paris. His most famous pupils were Louis Moreau Gottschalk
Louis Moreau Gottschalk
Louis Moreau Gottschalk was an American composer and pianist, best known as a virtuoso performer of his own romantic piano works...
and Camille Saint-Saëns
Camille Saint-Saëns
Charles-Camille Saint-Saëns was a French Late-Romantic composer, organist, conductor, and pianist. He is known especially for The Carnival of the Animals, Danse macabre, Samson and Delilah, Piano Concerto No. 2, Cello Concerto No. 1, Havanaise, Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, and his Symphony...
.
Stamaty was the star pupil of Friedrich Kalkbrenner
Friedrich Kalkbrenner
Friedrich Wilhelm Michael Kalkbrenner was a German pianist, composer, piano teacher and piano manufacturer who spent most of his life in England and France. Before the advent of Frédéric Chopin, Sigismond Thalberg and Franz Liszt, Kalkbrenner was by many considered to be the foremost pianist in...
and heir to Kalkbrenner's teaching method. He taught a crisp, fine, even filigree piano playing that concentrated on evenness of scales, independence of fingers and minimum movement of body and arms.
Stamaty composed a great number of piano studies (études), various other shorter piano works (the usual waltzes, fantasies, quadrilles, and variations so dear to the 19th century), a piano concerto
Piano concerto
A piano concerto is a concerto written for piano and orchestra.See also harpsichord concerto; some of these works are occasionally played on piano...
and some chamber music
Chamber music
Chamber music is a form of classical music, written for a small group of instruments which traditionally could be accommodated in a palace chamber. Most broadly, it includes any art music that is performed by a small number of performers with one performer to a part...
. None of his music is still in the repertoire today, although a good look at his once famous études might be very worthwhile. New recordings of his best output (concert études, piano concerto), possibly on period instruments, would be desirable.
Descent and family background
Camille-Marie Stamaty, born in RomeRome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
, was the son of a naturalized Greek father (hence the name) and a French mother. His father was for a time French consul in the Italian town of Civitavecchia
Civitavecchia
Civitavecchia is a town and comune of the province of Rome in the central Italian region of Lazio. A sea port on the Tyrrhenian Sea, it is located 80 kilometers west-north-west of Rome, across the Mignone river. The harbor is formed by two piers and a breakwater, on which is a lighthouse...
. His mother was French and according to Antoine François Marmontel
Antoine François Marmontel
Antoine François Marmontel was a French pianist, teacher and musicographer.Marmontel entered the Paris Conservatory in 1827. His teachers were Pierre Zimmerman in pianoforte, Victor Dourlen in harmony, Jacques Fromental Halévy in fugue and Jean-François Le Sueur in composition...
, who probably knew her, a fine singer of Italian operatic arias. Stamaty's father died in 1818, which forced the family to move back to France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
, first to Dijon
Dijon
Dijon is a city in eastern France, the capital of the Côte-d'Or département and of the Burgundy region.Dijon is the historical capital of the region of Burgundy. Population : 151,576 within the city limits; 250,516 for the greater Dijon area....
, later on to Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
.
1825-1836: Musical training and education
Stamaty did not have musical training from an early age on. Marmontel mentions that his musical studies had to take second place after classes in literature and history. Stamaty did not have a piano of his own before he was fourteen years of age. His mother on the advice of her family was against a career of her son in music, although Stamaty showed considerable musical gifts from an early age on. Stamaty’s family wanted him to become a diplomat, a civil engineer or a clerk in the administration.Stamaty did become a civil servant but he did not give up on music altogether. In his spare time he kept practicing and composing and his playing must have been so good that he could perform at soirees in fashionable Parisian homes. This was no mean achievement as Paris was considered to be the city of pianists and Stamaty had ample competition in fashionable salons from luminaries such as Sigismond Thalberg
Sigismond Thalberg
Sigismond Thalberg was a composer and one of the most distinguished virtuoso pianists of the 19th century.- Descent and family background :...
, Franz Liszt
Franz Liszt
Franz Liszt ; ), was a 19th-century Hungarian composer, pianist, conductor, and teacher.Liszt became renowned in Europe during the nineteenth century for his virtuosic skill as a pianist. He was said by his contemporaries to have been the most technically advanced pianist of his age...
, Stephen Heller
Stephen Heller
----Stephen Heller was a Hungarian composer and pianist whose career spanned the period from Schumann to Bizet, and was an influence for later Romantic composers.-Biography:...
, Henri Herz
Henri Herz
Henri Herz was a pianist and composer, Austrian by birth, and French by domicile.Herz was born Heinrich Herz in Vienna...
, Émile Prudent
Émile Prudent
Émile Racine Gauthier Prudent was a French pianist and composer.Born at Angoulême, he never knew his parents and was adopted at an early age by a piano tuner, who gave him his first musical instruction. At ten, he entered the Paris Conservatoire, winning a first prize in piano in 1833, and a...
and scores of lesser known piano players.
1832: Kalkbrenner’s star pupil
Finally it was an encounter with Friedrich KalkbrennerFriedrich Kalkbrenner
Friedrich Wilhelm Michael Kalkbrenner was a German pianist, composer, piano teacher and piano manufacturer who spent most of his life in England and France. Before the advent of Frédéric Chopin, Sigismond Thalberg and Franz Liszt, Kalkbrenner was by many considered to be the foremost pianist in...
that decided Stamaty's fate. Kalkbrenner had been looking for a pupil who would continue his school for some time. He had considered Frédéric Chopin
Frédéric Chopin
Frédéric François Chopin was a Polish composer and virtuoso pianist. He is considered one of the great masters of Romantic music and has been called "the poet of the piano"....
, but Chopin on the advice of his teacher Józef Elsner
Józef Elsner
Józef Antoni Franciszek was a composer, music teacher and music theoretician, active mainly in Warsaw...
had turned him down. The same had happened with Charles Hallé
Charles Hallé
Sir Charles Hallé was an Anglo-German pianist and conductor, and founder of The Hallé orchestra in 1858.-Life:Hallé was born in Hagen, Westphalia, Germany who after settling in England changed his name from Karl Halle...
. Hallé too had at first sought out Kalkbrenner to become his pupil, but Kalkbrenner's stiff, old-fashioned and even flawed playing deterred Hallé so much, that he decided otherwise.
Stamaty in many ways was the ideal candidate for Kalkbrenner. He was talented, ambitious and in addition to that he was poor and bored at his job in the Préfecture. And above all he was prepared to suffer Kalkbrenner who had a reputation as a martinet. Marmontel shrewdly points out that, as Stamaty was no artist on the scale of Chopin and thus lacked the strong personality of the great genius, he was ideally suited for Kalkbrenner's strict regime.
So when Kalkbrenner heard Stamaty play a quadrille
Quadrille
Quadrille is a historic dance performed by four couples in a square formation, a precursor to traditional square dancing. It is also a style of music...
with variations of his own composition he approached Stamaty and made him a business proposal: Stamaty would become his pupil and his répètiteur at the same time. A répètiteur was an auxiliary teacher to Kalkbrenner who in his later years did little teaching himself. Kalkbrenner gave fashionable and very expensive piano courses for selected pupils, while Stamaty would prepare students for these courses and do all the preparatory teaching.
1832-1836: Studies with Benoist, Reicha and Mendelssohn
Even as teacher Stamaty (one guesses supervised by Kalkbrenner) did not neglect his studies in music theory. He received lessons in organ playing from François BenoistFrançois Benoist
François Benoist was a French organist, composer, and pedagogue.Benoist was born in Nantes. He studied music at the Conservatoire de Paris and won the Prix de Rome in 1815 for his cantata Œnone. In 1819, he became organist and professor of organ at the Conservatoire; he held the latter post for...
and in harmony and counter-point from Anton Reicha
Anton Reicha
Anton Reicha was a Czech-born, later naturalized French composer. A contemporary and lifelong friend of Beethoven, Reicha is now best remembered for his substantial early contribution to the wind quintet literature and his role as a teacher – his pupils included Franz Liszt and Hector Berlioz...
.
Finally, in October 1836 Stamaty went to Leipzig
Leipzig
Leipzig Leipzig has always been a trade city, situated during the time of the Holy Roman Empire at the intersection of the Via Regia and Via Imperii, two important trade routes. At one time, Leipzig was one of the major European centres of learning and culture in fields such as music and publishing...
to receive the finishing touches of his education from Felix Mendelssohn
Felix Mendelssohn
Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn Barthóldy , use the form 'Mendelssohn' and not 'Mendelssohn Bartholdy'. The Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians gives ' Felix Mendelssohn' as the entry, with 'Mendelssohn' used in the body text...
. Mendelssohn writes about the lessons he gave Stamaty in a letter to Ferdinand Hiller
Ferdinand Hiller
Ferdinand Hiller was a German composer, conductor, writer and music-director.-Biography:Ferdinand Hiller was born to a wealthy Jewish family in Frankfurt am Main, where his father Justus was a merchant in English textiles – a business eventually continued by Ferdinand’s brother Joseph...
on October 29, 1836:
- "Stamaty is staying here, and I have got to teach him counterpoint – I declare I really don’t know much about it myself. He says, however, that that is only my modesty."
On November 26, 1836, Mendelssohn wrote some more about Stamaty to Hiller:
- "Stamaty will be at Frankfort in a few days, on his way back to Paris. I maintain that he has got de lAllemagne and du contrepoint double par dessus les Oreilles".
Stamaty figured also in a letter Mendelssohn’s sister Rebecca wrote to Karl Klingemann on October 4, 1836:
- "Moreover, Kalkbrenner’s best pupil, Mr. Stamaty, élève du conservatoire de Paris, and popular music master, is here in Germany learning music from Felix, and refuses to play until he has learned something better".
1835-1870: Celebrity teacher
For some 35 years (1835–1870) Stamaty must have been the most sought after and the most fashionable piano teacher in Paris. He had numerous students, most of them from wealthy families in the aristocratic Faubourgs (Saint-Germain and Saint-Honoré). He charged some of the highest fees in Paris. According to Marmontel he was a born teacher and also had the useful talent of inspiring trust not so much in his pupils but in their mothers:- Let's add that he (Stamaty) combined all the proper qualities that would inspire confidence and trust in mothers of families: Distinction, reserve, correct and pure talent. He talked little and achieved a lot.
Apart from Louis Moreau Gottschalk
Louis Moreau Gottschalk
Louis Moreau Gottschalk was an American composer and pianist, best known as a virtuoso performer of his own romantic piano works...
, Stamaty's most famous pupil was Camille Saint-Saëns
Camille Saint-Saëns
Charles-Camille Saint-Saëns was a French Late-Romantic composer, organist, conductor, and pianist. He is known especially for The Carnival of the Animals, Danse macabre, Samson and Delilah, Piano Concerto No. 2, Cello Concerto No. 1, Havanaise, Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, and his Symphony...
. Saint-Saëns started with Stamaty when he was seven years old (1842) and he stayed with him until he was fourteen (1849), whence he went on to the Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
Conservatoire. Although Saint-Saëns in his later life was very critical, even dismissive of Stamaty's teaching, it is a fact that Saint-Saëns under Stamaty's tutelage developed into a first rate pianist who maintained the high level of his playing all his life, well into his eighties.
Personal life and crisis (1848)
Stamaty from the age of 19 on suffered from nervous exhaustion, overwork and frequent and severe bouts from what was then called rheumatismRheumatism
Rheumatism or rheumatic disorder is a non-specific term for medical problems affecting the joints and connective tissue. The study of, and therapeutic interventions in, such disorders is called rheumatology.-Terminology:...
. Sometimes these illnesses lasted for up to half a year; during this time Stamaty was forced to give up all musical activities . When his mother died in 1846, Stamaty grieved so much that he left Paris to retreat to Rome for a full year.
Stamaty married in 1848 and became the father of four children. Marmontel points out that Stamaty was the most devoted of husbands and fathers.
Piano technique
Stamaty's piano technique has its roots in the piano manufacturing craft of the first decades of the 19th century. Most pianos manufactured in France before 1850 had a light action and an easy touch. These pianos were ideal for the execution of rapid scales, facile arpeggios and quickly repeated notes. This resulted in an elegant and glittering bravura playing ideally suited for salons and smaller venues.Stamaty's piano technique was firmly rooted in the pre-Steinway area of those pianos built according the old system (wooden frame). Marmontel clearly states that Stamaty was a pianist of style but was no transcendental virtuoso and that his playing lacked warmth, colour and brilliance. Stamaty's method prescribed complete immobility of body and arms, elbows tucked into the body and all action of the muscles limited to finger and forearms. Saint-Saens who during his long life had witnessed the development from the old purely digital technique to the transcendental virtuosity of Franz Liszt
Franz Liszt
Franz Liszt ; ), was a 19th-century Hungarian composer, pianist, conductor, and teacher.Liszt became renowned in Europe during the nineteenth century for his virtuosic skill as a pianist. He was said by his contemporaries to have been the most technically advanced pianist of his age...
, Anton Rubinstein
Anton Rubinstein
Anton Grigorevich Rubinstein was a Russian-Jewish pianist, composer and conductor. As a pianist he was regarded as a rival of Franz Liszt, and he ranks amongst the great keyboard virtuosos...
and even Leopold Godowsky
Leopold Godowsky
Leopold Godowsky was a famed Polish American pianist, composer, and teacher. One of the most highly regarded performers of his time, he became known for his theories concerning the application of relaxed weight and economy of motion in piano playing, principles later propagated by Godowsky's...
sums up the advantages and the drawbacks of the Kalkbrenner-Stamaty school like this:
- "Firmness of the fingers is not the only thing that one learns from Kalkbrenner’s method for there is also refinement of the quality of the sound made by the fingers alone, a valuable resource which is unusual in our day. Unfortunately, this school also invented the continuous legato, which is both false and monotonous; the abuse of nuances, and a mania for continuous expressivo used with no discrimination."
Selected works
His works include a great quantity of studies, shorter piano works (waltzes, fantasies, quadrilles, variations), several sonatas, some chamber music and a piano concerto. The only work of his still in print are the Finger Rhythm Studies (Études des Doigts O. 36).Stamaty’s studies are really not too different from the studies by Carl Czerny
Carl Czerny
Carl Czerny was an Austrian pianist, composer and teacher. He is best remembered today for his books of études for the piano. Czerny's music was profoundly influenced by his teachers, Muzio Clementi, Johann Nepomuk Hummel, Antonio Salieri and Ludwig van Beethoven.-Early life:Carl Czerny was born...
. There are many similarities between Stamaty’s best output and Czerny’s more demanding studies such as his Études de Mécanisme op. 499.
- Piano Concerto in A-Minor, Op. 2
- Variations on an Original Theme, Op. 3
- Études pittoresques, Op. 21
- Études progressives, Opp. 37–39
- Chant et Mechanisme, Op. 38
- Études concertantes, Opp. 46, 47
- Les Farfadets
- Rhythme des doigts
- Six Études caractéristiques sur Obéron
- 12 transcriptions: Souvenir du Conservatoire
- Piano Sonata in F-Minor
- Piano Sonata in C-Minor
- Piano trio
Sources
- Chopin, Frédéric. Chopin's Letters. Unabridged and slightly corrected Dover Reprint (1988) of the original Knopf Edition. Edited by E.L. Voynich. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1931. ISBN 0486255646
- Ehrlich, Cyril. The Piano, A History. Revised Edition. Oxford (GB): Clarendon Press, 1990. ISBN 0198161719
- Hallé, C.E. Hallé and Marie. Life and Letters of Sir Charles Hallé. London (GB): Smith, Elder, & Co., 1896.
- Hense, Sebastian. The Mendelssohn Family (1729–1847), From Letters and Journals. Vol. 2. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1881.
- Hiller, Ferdinand. Mendelssohn - Letters and Recollections. London (GB): Macmillan and Co., 1874.
- Karasowski, Moritz. Frédèric Chopin - His Life and Letters. London: William Reeves, (no year given, probably 1880).
- Loggins, Vernon. Where the Word Ends - The Life of Louis Moreau Gottschalk. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1958. ISBN 080710373X
- Marmontel, Antoine Francois. Les Pianistes Célèbres. Paris: Imprimerie Centrale des Chemins de Fer A. Chaix et Cie, 1878.
- Saint-Saëns, Camille. Musical Memoirs. Translated by Edward Gile Rich. Boston: Small, Maynard & Company, 1919.
- Saint-Saëns, Camille. Musical Memoirs. Newly annotated edition edition by Roger Nichols. Oxford (GB): Oxford University Press 2008. ISBN 0195320166
- Schonberg, Harold C. The Great Pianists. Revised and Updated Edition. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1984. ISBN 0671638378
External links
- Free scores by Camille-Marie Stamaty in the International Music Score Library ProjectInternational Music Score Library ProjectThe International Music Score Library Project , also known as the Petrucci Music Library after publisher Ottaviano Petrucci, is a project for the creation of a virtual library of public domain music scores, based on the wiki principle...
- Unknown Pianist (Osamu N. Kanazawa?) playing Études by Camille-Marie Stamaty on YoutubeYouTubeYouTube is a video-sharing website, created by three former PayPal employees in February 2005, on which users can upload, view and share videos....