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Austrian conductor Gottfried Rabl talks about preparing and presenting the...
Florent Schmitt, photographed in about 1910. In early March 2020, I had the opportunity to attend what turned out to be the very last public performances of Florent Schmitt’s orchestral before the...
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Four important compositions of Florent Schmitt to be featured in the upcoming...
In a classical music world turned upside down by the COVID-19 pandemic, orchestras are bravely stepping forward in the 2020-21 concert season to commemorate French composer Florent Schmitt’s 150th...
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Florent Schmitt takes a breather: Petites musiques for solo piano (1906).
Florent Schmitt, photographed around 1900, several years before he composed Petites musiques. (Photo: Eugène Pirou) Within the extensive catalogue of compositions by Florent Schmitt are a great many...
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Pianist Edward Rushton talks about exploring Florent Schmitt’s repertoire of...
A very dapper Florent Schmitt, photographed in the 1890s. Considering that 2020 marks the 150th birthday anniversary of French composer Florent Schmitt, who lived from 1870 to 1958, it isn’t surprising...
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Just Announced: Prisma String Trio to make a new recording of Florent...
It will be just the third time the work has been commercially recorded — and the first one in more than three decades. French composer Florent Schmitt, photographed at his St-Cloud home in the 1940s....
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Florent Schmitt looks to the France of antiquity: Quatre poèmes de Ronsard...
The May 1924 edition of La Revue musicale, dedicated to the French poet Pierre de Ronsard. In May 1924, a new edition of the French magazine La Revue musicale hit the newsstands — one that was devoted...
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Deux pièces (1911), Florent Schmitt’s strikingly original chromatic harp...
Florent Schmitt’s Deux pièces pour harpe chromatique was one of numerous works commissioned from Parisian composers by Pleyel Wolff et Cie. to popularize its new instrument. Florent Schmitt’s three...
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Now available: A book featuring French painter Mathieu Cherkit’s artistic...
Mathieu Cherkit (Photo ©Michel Lunardelli, 2017) In 2018, an article was published on the Florent Schmitt Website + Blog about the French painter Mathieu Cherkit. One of the bright stars of France’s...
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Giving vibrant voice to powerful poetry: Florent Schmitt’s Trois Chants (1943).
French composers of the period really knew how to write vocal music. Composers like Ravel, Debussy and Florent Schmitt were taught how to write for the human voice. — Karina Gauvin, Canadian Soprano...
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Scottish composer Alistair Hinton talks about the influential artistry of...
“Florent Schmitt’s artistic legacy is of such importance that his work deserves all the exposure it can get. Once it has done so, it’s no exaggeration to say that the history of French music in the...
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On the occasion of Florent Schmitt’s 150th birthday anniversary, Crescendo...
A portrait of Florent Schmitt (Artist: Pierrette Lambert, 1992) As many readers of the Florent Schmitt Website + Blog are undoubtedly aware, 2020 marks the 150th birthday anniversary year for French...
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Florent Schmitt is featured as BBC Music Magazine‘s Composer of the Month in...
Composer of the Month designation coincides with the commemoration of Schmitt’s 150th birthday anniversary. Florent Schmitt (illustration/collage by Matt Herring for BBC Music Magazine, September...
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Just released: A new recording of four Florent Schmitt orchestral works with...
The new NAXOS release features two iconic ballet suites along with two world premiere recordings. The 2015 NAXOS recording. Back in 2015, a recording of the music of Florent Schmitt on the NAXOS...
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Florent Schmitt’s affectionate tribute to Frédéric Chopin: Le Chant de la...
Frédéric Chopin (1810-1849) Recently, audio documentation one of Florent Schmitt’s most interesting (and elusive) choral compositions has emerged – and it’s come from an unlikely source. It is a 1987...
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Investigating the mystery – and promise – of Florent Schmitt’s “Poèmes des...
Florent Schmitt, photographed in 1900 around the time he composed the vocal works that he brought together under the broad title “Poèmes des lacs.” (Photo: Eugène Pirou) Recently, two documents have...
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Florent Schmitt and the Besançon International Competition for Young Conductors
The elderly composer chaired the jury at the Besançon’s first competition in 1951. A large wall poster advertising the 2019 Besançon International Competition for Young Conductors. These days there’s...
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Israeli pianist and pedagogue Tomer Lev talks about planning and producing...
“What stands out in Schmitt’s work is the hypnotic-impressionist atmosphere, verging on the surreal. Both the atmospherics and the piano writing … hint very strongly at Debussy’s own aesthetic world....
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In a concert season upended by COVID-19, Florent Schmitt’s original scoring...
The 2020-21 season includes performances of the small-orchestra version in Japan, Germany and France. As is so well-known to music-lovers everywhere, the COVID-19 pandemic has wreaked havoc on...
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Florent Schmitt and the piano collection à l’Exposition: Musical vignettes of...
Florent Schmitt, photographed at his home in St-Cloud in 1937. (Photo: Lipnitzki-Roger Viollet) For students of history, the International Exposition of Art and Technology in Modern Life —...
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JoAnn Falletta’s Buffalo Philharmonic recording of Florent Schmitt’s...
The 2020 NAXOS recording, completed just days before the COVID pandemic shuttered classical music performances across the globe, includes two colorful ballet scores along with two world premieres....
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