Léo Ferré was a French-born Monégasque poet and composer, and a dynamic and controversial live performer. He released some forty albums over this period, composing the music and the majority of the lyrics. He released many hit singles, particularly between 1960 and the mid-1970s. Some of his songs have become classics of the French chanson repertoire, including "Avec le temps", "C'est extra", "Jolie Môme" and "Paris-Canaille".
William Vincent Wallace was an Irish composer and pianist. In his day, he was famous on three continents as a double virtuoso on violin and piano. Nowadays, he is mainly remembered as an opera composer of note, with key works such as Maritana (1845) and Lurline (1847/60), but he also wrote a large amount of piano music that was much in vogue in the 19th century. His more modest output of songs and ballads, equally wide-ranging in style and difficulty, was also popular in his day, some numbers being associated with famous singers of the time.
Danielle Ebguy (1950), known professionally as Sapho, is a French-Moroccan singer.
Cigale is a divertissement-ballet in two acts by Jules Massenet to a scenario by Henri Cain. It was composed in Égreville during the summer of 1902, first published by Heugel in 1903 and premiered at the Opéra-Comique in Paris on 4 February 1904. The first performance was part of a benefit programme for former musical and technical staff of the house, which raised over 10,000 francs. The programme having commenced with Bastien et Bastienne in a translation by Georges Hartmann and Henry Gauthier-Villars, also included Debussy's Damoiselle élue, with Mary Garden and J Passama, conducted by André Messager, a feature on musical interpretation under hypnosis by Professeur Magnin, poetry readings by Mlle Bartet and Coquelin ainé, songs from Yvette Guilbert, a selection of French operatic airs, a one-act pantomime entitled Feminissima with Jean Delvoye among the singers, and the 2nd act of Don Pasquale with Korsoff as Louise, Fugère as don Pasquale, Edmond Clément as Octave and Delvoye as the doctor.
Les surprises de l'Amour is an opéra-ballet in two entrées and a prologue by the French composer Jean-Philippe Rameau. It was first performed in Versailles on 27 November 1748. The opera is set to a libretto by Gentil-Bernard. According to the usage of the time, it was originally just billed as a ballet and was only later classified by scholars as an opéra-ballet, although its content might more precisely ascribe it to the ballet héroïque genre.
Geoffrey Grey is a British classical composer.
Biomusic is a form of experimental music which deals with sounds created or performed by non-humans. The definition is also sometimes extended to include sounds made by humans in a directly biological way. For instance, music that is created by the brain waves of the composer can also be called biomusic as can music created by the human body without the use of tools or instruments that are not part of the body.
Ludwig Minkus, also known as Léon Fyodorovich Minkus, was an Austrian composer of ballet music, a violinist and teacher of music.
Jean-Baptiste Lully was a French composer, dancer and instrumentalist of Italian birth, who is considered a master of the French Baroque music style. Best known for his operas, he spent most of his life working in the court of Louis XIV of France and became a French subject in 1661. He was a close friend of the playwright Molière, with whom he collaborated on numerous comédie-ballets, including L'Amour médecin, George Dandin ou le Mari confondu, Monsieur de Pourceaugnac, Psyché and his best known work, Le Bourgeois gentilhomme.
Mathieu Ganio is a French danseur étoile of the Paris Opera Ballet.
Marie-Claude Georgette Yvonne Pietragalla is a French dancer and choreographer.
Il n'y a plus rien is an album by Léo Ferré, released in 1973 by Barclay Records. The general mood of the music here is dark, both exasperated and desperate, and the lyrics "paint pictures of sordid Parisian clubs, of the injustice of society, of death and of life, of lost friendships and of failing domestic relationships".
Verlaine et Rimbaud is an album by Léo Ferré. It was released in December 1964 by Barclay Records. This album is one of the first studio double albums in popular music history.
Léo Ferré chante Baudelaire is an album by Léo Ferré, released in 1967 by Barclay Records. It is his fourth LP dedicated to a poet, after a first Baudelaire effort in 1957, Les Chansons d'Aragon in 1961, and Verlaine et Rimbaud in 1964. It is also his second studio double album.
Les Fleurs du mal is an album by Léo Ferré, released in 1957 by Odeon Records. It is his first LP dedicated to a poet and this is the first time in popular music history a whole album is dedicated to a dead poet. Léo Ferré has set Baudelaire into music two more times : in 1967 with double album Léo Ferré chante Baudelaire, and with unfinished project Les Fleurs du mal , recorded in 1977 but posthumously released in 2008.
La Chanson du mal-aimé is an oratorio composed by Léo Ferré in 1952–53 on Guillaume Apollinaire's eponymous poem. This piece for four soloist singers, choir and orchestra is an example of an oratorio that is not based on a religious subject. It was created on stage in the Opéra de Monte-Carlo (Monaco), on 29 April 1954, then was recorded and released on an LP for the first time in 1957. Ferré recorded an alternate version in 1972, wherein he sang all by himself, instead of using any classical singers.
Jean-Luc Chaignaud is a French soloist baritone, singer of operas, lieder and oratorio.
La Vie moderne: intégrale 1944–1959 is a 14-CD box set compilation of Léo Ferré studio and live albums recorded for Le Chant du Monde and Odeon Records between 1950 and 1958. The box set brings together for the first time nine historical albums, several 78s and 45s cuts, rarities and unreleased radio archives, with many alternative versions. Lyrics are not included. This is the first box set of a complete collection of works recorded by the artist.
