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The Fontainebleau Schools were founded in 1921, and consist of two schools: The American Conservatory, and the School of Fine Arts at Fontainebleau.
When the American Expeditionary Forces entered the First World War, the commander of its army, General Pershing, decided the quality of US military band music needed improvement. Walter Damrosch, then conductor of the New York Philharmonic, was asked to organize a school in Chaumont, where US troops were headquartered, led by composer and teacher fr:Francis Casadesus.
The conservatory was created during World War I when the US sought to build a music school to improve the U.S. military bands, headquartered in France. [1]
After the war, Damrosch and Casadesus decided to continue this successful operation. With the full support of French authorities, as well as that of composer and organist Charles-Marie Widor, who became its first director, the American Conservatory, was granted permission to open in the Louis XV wing of the Chateau of Fontainebleau. The American Conservatory (Fr. Conservatoire américain de Fontainebleau) intended to offer the best of French musical education to young, promising musicians.
Since 1921, the teaching staff has included renowned faculty such as: the trio Pasquier, Maurice Ravel, Camille Saint-Saëns, Marcel Dupré, Robert and Gaby Casadesus, Charles-Marie Widor, Henri Dutilleux, Gilbert Amy, Betsy Jolas, André Boucourechliev, Pierre Amoyal, Sviatoslav Richter, Mstislav Rostropovitch, Igor Stravinsky, Arthur Rubinstein, Tristan Murail and Leonard Bernstein.
Nadia Boulanger, a young composition/harmony professor, was among this distinguished faculty from the beginning. Her energy, knowledge, and her spirit guided the school until 1979. Her close friend Isidor Philipp headed the piano departments of both the Paris Conservatory and the American Conservatory. His renown in the US helped bring many American composers. The current director presiding over the school is Diana Ligeti.
Under such renowned guidance, the American Conservatory influenced many of the best American musicians such as: Elliott Carter, Kenton Coe, Aaron Copland, Samuel Dushkin, Roy Harris, Kenneth Lampl, Dee Libbey, Helen Roessing, Louise Talma, Virgil Thomson, Beveridge Webster, and many others.
For a full history of the school, see Leonard, Kendra. The Conservatoire Americain: a History, Lanham, Md: Scarecrow Press, 2007 [2]
The School of Fine Arts at Fontainebleau (Fr, École des Beaux-Arts at Fontainebleau), was founded in 1923. It was an expansion of the Conservatoire Américain (American Conservatory), established in the Fontainebleau Chateau in 1921. [1] The School of Fine Arts provided programs in painting, sculpture, and architecture, and architecture flourished with its inspiration from the historic architecture in the region. [1]
It adopted the same mission as the music conservatory in the spheres of painting, architecture, and sculpture. Inspired by setting of the Chateau and its magnificent formal gardens, over time, the program has narrowed it focus to exclusively teach architecture.
Its faculty has included prestigious international names in architecture, including F. Candela, A. Cuny, B. Doshi, Sheila Hicks, L. Kroll, R. Licata, R. Péchére, B. Rasica, Paolo Soleri, J. Soltan, A. Van Eyck, Y. Wohlert, Juan Nakpil, and I. García.
Past directors of the school are Jacques Carlu, A. Remondet, P. Devinoy, Bernard de la Tour d'Auvergne, Marion Tournon-Branly, and J.L. Nouvian.
The Beaux-Arts de Paris, formally the École nationale supérieure des beaux-arts, is a French grande école whose primary mission is to provide high-level fine arts education and training. The art school, which is part of the Paris Sciences et Lettres University, is located on two sites: Saint-Germain-des-Prés in Paris, and Saint-Ouen.
The Conservatoire de Paris, also known as the Paris Conservatory, is a college of music and dance founded in 1795. Officially known as the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris (CNSMDP), it is situated in the avenue Jean Jaurès in the 19th arrondissement of Paris, France. The Conservatoire offers instruction in music and dance, drawing on the traditions of the 'French School'.
Juliette Nadia Boulanger was a French music teacher, conductor and composer. She taught many of the leading composers and musicians of the 20th century, and also performed occasionally as a pianist and organist.
Louise Juliette Talma was an American composer, academic, and pianist. After studies in New York and in France, piano with Isidor Philipp and composition with Nadia Boulanger, she focused on composition from 1935. She taught at the American Conservatory in Fontainebleau, and at Hunter College. Her opera The Alcestiad was the first full-scale opera by an American woman staged in Europe. She was the first woman in the National Institute of Arts and Letters and the first woman awarded the Sibelius Medal for Composition.
Robert Marcel Casadesus was a renowned 20th-century French pianist and composer. He was the most prominent member of a distinguished musical family, being the nephew of Henri Casadesus and Marius Casadesus, husband of Gaby Casadesus, and father of Jean Casadesus.
Gaby Casadesus was a French classical pianist and teacher born in Marseille. She was married to the French pianist Robert Casadesus and their son Jean was also a notable pianist.
The Royal Conservatory of Brussels is a historic conservatory in Brussels, Belgium. Starting its activities in 1813, it received its official name in 1832. Providing performing music and drama courses, the institution became renowned partly because of the international reputation of its successive directors such as François-Joseph Fétis, François-Auguste Gevaert, Edgar Tinel, Joseph Jongen and Marcel Poot, but more because it has been attended by many of the top musicians, actors and artists in Belgium such as Arthur Grumiaux, José Van Dam, Sigiswald Kuijken, Josse De Pauw, Luk van Mello and Luk De Konink. Adolphe Sax, inventor of the saxophone, also studied at the Brussels Conservatory.
Jean Claude Michel Casadesus was a French classical pianist. He was the son of the renowned pianists Robert and Gaby Casadesus, and grandnephew of Henri Casadesus and Marius Casadesus.
Georges Barrère was a French flutist.
The George Enescu National University of Arts is a public university in Iași, Romania, founded in 1860. It was named in honor of the composer George Enescu.
Kendra Preston Leonard is an American musicologist. She specialized in women in music and music in screen history in 20th century France, Britain, and America.
Émile Naoumoff is a Bulgarian pianist and composer. He revealed himself a musical prodigy at age five, taking up study of the piano and adding composition to his studies a year later. At the age of eight, after a fateful meeting in Paris, he became the last disciple of Nadia Boulanger, who referred to him as "the gift of my old age". He studied with her until her death in late 1979. Boulanger gave him the opportunity to work with Clifford Curzon, Igor Markevitch, Robert and Gaby Casadesus, Nikita Magaloff, Jean Françaix, Leonard Bernstein, Soulima Stravinsky, Aram Khachaturian, Sviatoslav Richter and Yehudi Menuhin. Lord Menuhin conducted the premiere of Naoumoff's first Piano Concerto, with the composer as soloist when he was ten years old. He pursued studies at the Paris Conservatory with Lélia Gousseau, Pierre Sancan, Geneviève Joy-Dutilleux, as well as at the Ecole Normale de Musique de Paris with Pierre Dervaux (conducting).
Dorothy Rudd Moore was an American composer and music educator. She was one of the co-founders of the Society of Black Composers. She is considered one of the leading women composers of color for her generation and did commissions for the National Symphony, Opera Ebony, the Buffalo Philharmonic, and solo artists. She was a member of the American Composers Alliance, BMI, New York Singing Teachers Association, and New York Women Composers. Her works were unpublished, but are available through the American Composers Alliance.
Marlon Daniel is an American composer, conductor, and music director. He is known for being a specialist in the music of Chevalier de Saint-Georges. Daniel was the winner of the 2009 John and Mary Virginia Foncannon Conducting Award, and a prizewinner at the 2018 Bucharest Symphony Orchestra International Conducting Competition.
The Haute école de musique de Lausanne is a Swiss music school located in Romandy, the French-speaking western part of Switzerland. It is a constituent institution of the University of Applied Sciences Western Switzerland.
Béatrice Casadesus is a French painter and sculptor, and professor at the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris, France.
Bartu Elci-Ozsoy is a violinist, conductor, and composer. He made his triple debut in Paris at the age of 15 by conducting his 1st Symphony and playing the Violin Concerto of Mendelssohn on 26 May 2019 with the Orchestre Sinfonietta at the Théâtre des Variétés. He also conducted the 29th Symphony of Mozart at the same concert.
Helen Elizabeth Roessing Aiton was an American composer of piano music whose composition won first prize at the Conservatoire Americain de Fountainebleau in France. She published her music under the name Helen Roessing.
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