Preferred Name
Lydia R. Carroll
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Date of Graduation
5-2-2019
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Musical Arts (DMA)
Department
School of Music
Advisor(s)
Beth E. Chandler
Pedro R. Aponte
Jeanette Zyko
Abstract
Louis Fleury (1878-1926) was a skilled flutist, respected writer and critic, prolific music editor, and new music enthusiast in France at the turn of the twentieth century. Unfortunately, Fleury’s legacy has been overshadowed by figures such as his teacher Paul Taffanel (1844-1908), as well as his contemporaries, including renowned flutists Philippe Gaubert (1879-1941), Marcel Moyse (1889-1984), and Georges Barrère (1876-1944). Fleury studied with Taffanel at the Paris Conservatoire from 1895-1900. Today Taffanel is regarded as having established the modern French Flute School, which is a tradition of flute playing and pedagogy. The legacy of the French Flute School of the late-nineteenth and early twentieth centuries impacted modern flute playing with its emphasis on beautiful sound, effortless technique, and mature musical interpretation. Many of Taffanel’s predecessors emphasized technique over artistry, especially in their repertoire selections. Taffanel and his prominent students, such as Louis Fleury, highly influenced the repertoire for the flute in the twentieth century through numerous commissions of works, as well as through a revival of forgotten works of the baroque and classical periods.
Louis Fleury served as the dedicatee for many new flute works; these works extended the boundaries of the previous era in the flute’s range and expression, as well as helped to elevate the place of the flute as a solo instrument in the modern era. Selected flute works dedicated to Louis Fleury between 1913 and 1923 display the expressive and technical capabilities of the flute through the use of extra-musical references, novel harmonic language, and rhythmic complexity. This document will begin with the influence of Paul Taffanel and the French Flute School on Louis Fleury’s place as performer and music dedicatee. It will then provide context and pertinent musical analysis for six works dedicated to Fleury: Syrinx (1913) by Claude Debussy, The Extatic Shepherd (1922) by Cyril Scott, Deux Pièces pour Flûte et Piano, I. Danse pour une déesse (1913) by Reynaldo Hahn, Suite in Three Movements, Op. 64 (1921) by Cyril Bradley Rootham, Jeux: Sonatine pour flûte et piano (1923) by Jacques Ibert, and Sonate pour deux flûtes, Op. 75 (1922) by Charles Koechlin.
Recommended Citation
Carroll, Lydia, "Music for a new era: Selected works dedicated to flutist Louis Fleury (1878-1926)" (2019). Dissertations, 2014-2019. 217.
https://commons.lib.jmu.edu/diss201019/217
