Emile Paladilhe
Encyclopedia
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...
composer
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
of the late romantic
Romantic music
Romantic music or music in the Romantic Period is a musicological and artistic term referring to a particular period, theory, compositional practice, and canon in Western music history, from 1810 to 1900....
period.
Biography
Émile Paladilhe was born in MontpellierMontpellier
-Neighbourhoods:Since 2001, Montpellier has been divided into seven official neighbourhoods, themselves divided into sub-neighbourhoods. Each of them possesses a neighbourhood council....
. He was a musical child prodigy
Child prodigy
A child prodigy is someone who, at an early age, masters one or more skills far beyond his or her level of maturity. One criterion for classifying prodigies is: a prodigy is a child, typically younger than 18 years old, who is performing at the level of a highly trained adult in a very demanding...
, and moved from his home in the south of France 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...
to begin his studies at the Conservatoire de Paris
Conservatoire de Paris
The Conservatoire de Paris is a college of music and dance founded in 1795, now situated in the avenue Jean Jaurès in the 19th arrondissement of Paris, France...
at age 10. He became an accomplished pianist
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:...
, and was the youngest winner of the Prix de Rome
Prix de Rome
The Prix de Rome was a scholarship for arts students, principally of painting, sculpture, and architecture. It was created, initially for painters and sculptors, in 1663 in France during the reign of Louis XIV. It was an annual bursary for promising artists having proved their talents by...
, three years after Bizet
Georges Bizet
Georges Bizet formally Alexandre César Léopold Bizet, was a French composer, mainly of operas. In a career cut short by his early death, he achieved few successes before his final work, Carmen, became one of the most popular and frequently performed works in the entire opera repertory.During a...
, in 1860. For a time Galli-Marié
Célestine Marié
Célestine Galli-Marié was a French mezzo-soprano most famous for creating the title role in the opera Carmen.-Career:...
was his lover, and she helped create some of his works. Paladilhe married the daughter of the librettist Ernest Legouvé
Ernest Legouvé
Gabriel Jean Baptiste Ernest Wilfrid Legouvé was a French dramatist.-Biography:Son of the poet Gabriel-Marie Legouvé , he was born in Paris. His mother died in 1810, and almost immediately afterwards his father was removed to a lunatic asylum. The child, however, inherited a considerable fortune,...
. He formed a friendship with the elderly Charles Gounod.
He wrote a number of compositions for the stage, a symphony
Symphony
A symphony is an extended musical composition in Western classical music, scored almost always for orchestra. A symphony usually contains at least one movement or episode composed according to the sonata principle...
, over a hundred mélodie
Mélodie
Mélodie refers to French art songs of the mid-19th century to the present; it is the French equivalent of the German Lied. It is distinguished from a chanson, which is a folk or popular song.-Nature of the mélodie:...
s, piano works, and a wide range of sacred music, including cantata
Cantata
A cantata is a vocal composition with an instrumental accompaniment, typically in several movements, often involving a choir....
s, motet
Motet
In classical music, motet is a word that is applied to a number of highly varied choral musical compositions.-Etymology:The name comes either from the Latin movere, or a Latinized version of Old French mot, "word" or "verbal utterance." The Medieval Latin for "motet" is motectum, and the Italian...
s, masses, chorales, and a noted oratorio
Oratorio
An oratorio is a large musical composition including an orchestra, a choir, and soloists. Like an opera, an oratorio includes the use of a choir, soloists, an ensemble, various distinguishable characters, and arias...
, Les Saintes-Marie de la mer.
His opera Patrie! of 1886 was his greatest success, and was one of the last grand opera
Grand Opera
Grand opera is a genre of 19th-century opera generally in four or five acts, characterised by large-scale casts and orchestras, and lavish and spectacular design and stage effects, normally with plots based on or around dramatic historic events...
s to premier at the Paris Opéra
Palais Garnier
The Palais Garnier, , is an elegant 1,979-seat opera house, which was built from 1861 to 1875 for the Paris Opera. It was originally called the Salle des Capucines because of its location on the Boulevard des Capucines in the 9th arrondissement of Paris, but soon became known as the Palais Garnier...
.
A few of Paladilhe's works for solo woodwind and solo voice
Voice
Voice may refer to:* Human voice* Voice control or voice activation* Writer's voice* Voice acting* Voice vote* Voice message-In film:* Voice , a 2005 South Korean film* The Voice , a 2010 Turkish horror film directed by Ümit Ünal...
are still performed today, the most notable being his Solo pour hautbois, alternatively titled Solo de concert, written in 1898.
Operas
- La fiancée d'Abydos, 1864–66, fragments
- Le passant, opéra-comique in one act, (F. Coppée), f.p. Opéra-Comique, 24 April 1872
- L'amour africain, opéra-comique in two act, (E. Le Gouvé), f.p. Opéra-Comique, 8 May 1875
- Suzanne, opéra-comique in 3 acts, (de Lockroy & Cormon), f.p. Opéra-Comique, 30 December 1878
- Diana, opéra-comique in 3 acts, (Regnier & Normand), f.p. Opéra-Comique, 23 February 1885
- Patrie!, drame lyrique in 5 acts, (Sardou & Gallet), f.p. Montpellier, 1892, (composed 1886)
- Vanina, opéra in 4 acts, (Legouvé & Gallet), composed 1890 (unperformed)
- Dalila, opéra in 3 acts, (Feuillet et Gallet), composed 1896 (unperformed)