Darius Milhaud | |
|---|---|
.jpg) Milhaud in 1923 | |
| Born | (1892-09-04)4 September 1892 Marseille, France |
| Died | 22 June 1974(1974-06-22) (aged 81) Geneva, Switzerland |
| Education | Paris Conservatory |
| Occupations |
|
| Works | List of compositions |
| Spouse | Madeleine Milhaud Milhaud |
| Children | 1 |
Darius Milhaud (French:[daʁjysmijo]; 4 September 1892 – 22 June 1974) was a French composer, conductor, and teacher. He was a member ofLes Six—also known asThe Group of Six—and one of the most prolific composers of the 20th century. His compositions are influenced byjazz and Brazilian music and make extensive use ofpolytonality. Milhaud is considered one of the keymodernist composers.[1] A renowned teacher, he taught many future jazz and classical composers, includingBurt Bacharach,Dave Brubeck,Philip Glass,Steve Reich,Karlheinz Stockhausen andIannis Xenakis among others.
Milhaud was born inMarseille, the son of Sophie (Allatini) and Gad Gabriel Milhaud.[2] He grew up inAix-en-Provence, which he regarded as his true ancestral city.[3] His was a long-established Jewish family of theComtat Venaissin—a secluded region of Provence—with roots traceable there at least to the 15th century. On his father's side, Milhaud's Jewish lineage was thus neitherAshkenazi norSephardi, but specifically Provençal—dating to Jewish settlement in that part of France as early as the first centuries of the Common Era.[3] Milhaud's mother was partly Sephardi on her father's side, via a Sephardi family from Italy.[4][5]
Milhaud began as a violinist, later turning to composition. He studied at theParis Conservatory, where he met fellow Les Six membersArthur Honegger andGermaine Tailleferre. He studied composition withCharles Widor and harmony and counterpoint withAndré Gedalge. He also studied privately withVincent d'Indy. From 1917 to 1919, he served as secretary toPaul Claudel, the poet and dramatist who was then the French ambassador to Brazil, and with whom Milhaud collaborated for many years, writing music for many of his poems and plays. In Brazil, they collaborated on the balletL'Homme et son désir.[6]
On his return to France, Milhaud composed works influenced by Brazilian popular music, including songs by pianist and composerErnesto Nazareth.Le Bœuf sur le toit includes melodies by Nazareth and other popular Brazilian composers, and evokes the sounds ofCarnaval. Among the melodies is a Carnaval tune by the name of "The Bull on the Roof" (in Portuguese, which he translated to French 'Le boeuf sur le toit', known in English as 'The Ox on the Roof'). He also producedSaudades do Brasil, a suite of 12 dances evoking 12Rio de Janeiro neighborhoods. Shortly after the original piano version appeared, he orchestrated the suite.
Contemporary European influences were also important. Milhaud dedicated his Fifth String Quartet (1920) toArnold Schoenberg,[7] and the next year conducted both the French and British premieres ofPierrot lunaire after multiple rehearsals.[8] On a trip to the United States in 1922, Milhaud heard "authentic"jazz for the first time, on the streets ofHarlem,[9] which greatly influenced his music. The next year, he completedLa création du monde (The Creation of the World), using ideas and idioms from jazz, cast as a ballet in six continuous dance scenes.[9]
In 1925, Milhaud married his cousinMadeleine, an actress and reciter. In 1930 she gave birth to a son, the painter and sculptor Daniel Milhaud, who was the couple's only child.[10]
Nazi Germany's invasion of France forced the Milhauds to leave France in 1940.[11] They emigrated to the U.S. (Milhaud's Jewish background made it impossible for him to return to France until it wasliberated).[12] He secured a teaching post atMills College inOakland, California, where he composed the operaBolivar (1943) and collaborated withHenri Temianka and thePaganini Quartet. In an extraordinary concert there in 1949, theBudapest Quartet performed his 14th String Quartet, followed by thePaganini Quartet's performance of his 15th; and then both ensembles played the two pieces together as an octet.[13] In 1950, these pieces were performed at theAspen Music Festival by the Paganini andJuilliard String Quartets.[14]
On June 13,1945, hisSuite Francaise, – Normandie, Bretagne, Ile de France, Alsace-Lorraine, Provence, had its World Premiere performance at the Naumburg Orchestral Concerts, in the Naumburg Bandshell, Central Park, in the summer series.[15]
Jazz pianistDave Brubeck became one of Milhaud's most famous students when Brubeck studied at Mills College in the late 1940s. In a February 2010 interview withJazzWax, Brubeck said he attended Mills, a women's college (men were allowed in graduate programs), specifically to study with Milhaud, saying, "Milhaud was an enormously gifted classical composer and teacher who loved jazz and incorporated it into his work. My older brotherHoward was his assistant and had taken all of his classes."[16] Brubeck named his first sonDarius.
In 1947 Milhaud was among the founders of theMusic Academy of the West summer conservatory,[17] where songwriterBurt Bacharach was among his students.[18] Milhaud told Bacharach, "Don't be afraid of writing something people can remember and whistle. Don't ever feel discomfited by a melody."[19]
From 1947 to 1971, he taught alternate years at Mills and theParis Conservatoire, until poor health, which caused him to use a wheelchair during his later years (beginning in the 1930s), compelled him to retire. He also taught on the faculty of theAspen Music Festival and School. As well as Brubeck, his students includeWilliam Bolcom,Steve Reich,Katharine Mulky Warne, andRegina Hansen Willman. He died inGeneva at the age of 81, and he was buried in theSaint-Pierre Cemetery in Aix-en-Provence.[20]
Darius Milhaud was very prolific and composed for a wide range of genres. His opus list ended at 443.
Milhaud (like such contemporaries asPaul Hindemith,Gian Francesco Malipiero,Henry Cowell,Alan Hovhaness,Bohuslav Martinů, andHeitor Villa-Lobos) worked very rapidly. His most popular works includeLe bœuf sur le toit (a ballet that lent its name to the legendarycabaret Milhaud and other members of Les Six frequented),La création du monde (a ballet for small orchestra with solo saxophone, influenced by jazz),Scaramouche (a suite for two pianos, also for alto saxophone or clarinet and orchestra), andSaudades do Brasil (a dance suite). His autobiography is titledNotes sans musique (Notes Without Music), later revised asMa vie heureuse (My Happy Life). Please note: "Faire un boeuf" in French translate to "to do a jam session". DuringWW1 when assemblies were not allowed, therefore concert hall were closed, many musicians would meet in cafés or such. Some cafés were too small for ensembles and would practice on the roof of the establishment. WhenMadelaine Milhaud visitedMills College in the early eighties, Emmanuel ofRadio à la Carte was able to have a conversation with her about her husband's playing before they moved toCalifornia for a while. She shared that when people asked where they could hear the new young musicians, they would be told that the "Boeuf est sur le toit", the jam sessions is taking place on the roof.
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Writing in hisGuide to Twentieth Century Music, critic Mark Morris described Milhaud's work as "one of the unassessed quantities of 20th century music. For as one of its most prolific composers (around 450 works), the quality of his music is so patently uneven that the reputation for the banal and the shallow has masked what is or might be (given the paucity of performances) both inspired and fascinating."[23] For a composer of acknowledged influence and significance, a number of his pieces lack contemporary professional recordings, such as the second Viola Concerto – a consequence perhaps of his prolific and uneven output.
Lycée intercommunal Darius-Milhaud near Paris is named after him.
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