Élie-Miriam Delaborde (born Eraïm-Miriam Delaborde; 7 February 18399 December 1913) was a French virtuoso pianist and composer. He was also renowned as a player of the

pedal piano The pedal piano (or piano-pédalier or pédalier,) is a kind of piano that includes a pedalboard, enabling bass register notes to be played with the feet, as is standard on the organ. There are two broad types of pedal pianos: either the pedal ...

Life

His birth was registered under the name of his mother Lina Eraïm Miriam, aged 38, of Nantes, and an unnamed father. Delaborde was generally believed to be the illegitimate son of the composer and pianist Charles-Valentin Alkan and one of his high-class married pupils. Delaborde was the maiden name of Antoinette, mother of

George Sand Amantine Lucile Aurore Dupin de Francueil (; 1 July 1804 – 8 June 1876), best known by her pen name George Sand (), was a French novelist, memoirist and journalist. One of the most popular writers in Europe in her lifetime, bein ...

, the author and sometime lover of Alkan's friend Frédéric Chopin. Some writers have seen some significance in this. Alkan's withdrawal from public life had also coincided with the birth and upbringing of Delaborde. Alkan and Delaborde also shared several similarities such as their similar skill in playing the pedal piano and both of them being parrot enthusiasts. It was claimed that the pianist

Isidor Philipp Isidor Edmond Philipp (first name sometimes spelled Isidore) (2 September 1863 – 20 February 1958) was a French pianist, composer, and pedagogue of Jewish Hungarian descent. He was born in Budapest and died in Paris. Biography Isidor Philipp ...

averred that Delaborde detested his father, but this seems doubtful as Delaborde played Alkan's music and edited his works. He was a pupil of Alkan, Franz Liszt,

Ignaz Moscheles Isaac Ignaz Moscheles (; 23 May 179410 March 1870) was a Bohemian piano virtuoso and composer. He was based initially in London and later at Leipzig, where he joined his friend and sometime pupil Felix Mendelssohn as professor of piano at the Co ...

, and

Adolf von Henselt Georg Martin Adolf von Henselt (9 or 12 May 181410 October 1889) was a German composer and virtuoso pianist. Life Henselt was born at Schwabach, in Bavaria. At the age of three he began to learn the violin, and at five the piano under Josephe vo ...

. He made successful tours of England, Germany and Russia, and travelled with

Henri Vieuxtemps Henri François Joseph Vieuxtemps ( 17 February 18206 June 1881) was a Belgian composer and violinist. He occupies an important place in the history of the violin as a prominent exponent of the Franco-Belgian violin school during the mid-19th ce ...

and Henryk Wieniawski. In Spring of 1871, during the Franco-Prussian War, he escaped from France to London with his 121

parrot Parrots, also known as psittacines (), are birds of the roughly 398 species in 92 genera comprising the order Psittaciformes (), found mostly in tropical and subtropical regions. The order is subdivided into three superfamilies: the Psittacoide ...

s and

cockatoo A cockatoo is any of the 21 parrot species belonging to the family Cacatuidae, the only family in the superfamily Cacatuoidea. Along with the Psittacoidea (true parrots) and the Strigopoidea (large New Zealand parrots), they make up the orde ...

s, as well as 2 pet monkeys. One of these monkeys he named Isadora, in honor of Isidor Philipp. In 1873 he was appointed professor at the Paris Conservatoire, where his pupils included Olga Samaroff (one-time wife of

Leopold Stokowski Leopold Anthony Stokowski (18 April 1882 – 13 September 1977) was a British conductor. One of the leading conductors of the early and mid-20th century, he is best known for his long association with the Philadelphia Orchestra and his appear ...

), Aline van Barentzen, and Marie Poitevin, the dedicatee of

César Franck César-Auguste Jean-Guillaume Hubert Franck (; 10 December 1822 – 8 November 1890) was a French Romantic composer, pianist, organist, and music teacher born in modern-day Belgium. He was born in Liège (which at the time of his birth was pa ...

's '' Prelude, Chorale and Fugue''. Delaborde was a fencer, a passionate athlete, a bon vivant and a ladies' man. He also painted under the pseudonym "Miriam", and was a close friend of

Édouard Manet Édouard Manet (, ; ; 23 January 1832 – 30 April 1883) was a French modernist painter. He was one of the first 19th-century artists to paint modern life, as well as a pivotal figure in the transition from Realism to Impressionism. Bo ...

. Camille Saint-Saëns' Piano Concerto No. 3 was dedicated to Delaborde. He was in the circle of

Pauline Viardot Pauline Viardot (; 18 July 1821 – 18 May 1910) was a nineteenth-century French mezzo-soprano, pedagogue and composer of Spanish descent. Born Michelle Ferdinande Pauline García, her name appears in various forms. When it is not simply "Pauli ...

Ivan Turgenev Ivan Sergeyevich Turgenev (; rus, links=no, Ива́н Серге́евич Турге́невIn Turgenev's day, his name was written ., p=ɪˈvan sʲɪrˈɡʲe(j)ɪvʲɪtɕ tʊrˈɡʲenʲɪf; 9 November 1818 – 3 September 1883 (Old Style dat ...

and

Ernest Guiraud Ernest is a given name derived from Germanic word ''ernst'', meaning "serious". Notable people and fictional characters with the name include: People *Archduke Ernest of Austria (1553–1595), son of Maximilian II, Holy Roman Emperor *Ernest, M ...

. Delaborde was also a close friend of Georges Bizet and his wife,

Geneviève Genevieve (french: link=no, Sainte Geneviève; la, Sancta Genovefa, Genoveva; 419/422 AD – 502/512 AD) is the patroness saint of Paris in the Catholic and Orthodox traditions. Her feast is on 3 January. Genevieve was born in Nanterre an ...

. Delaborde may have been indirectly responsible for Bizet's death, which followed a swimming competition between the two, as a result of which Bizet caught a chill. After Bizet's death, Delaborde formed an alliance with Geneviève. Scholars have speculated that Delaborde and Geneviève were having an affair even before Bizet's death.Weber, Caroline. Proust's Duchess: How Three Celebrated Women Captured the Imagination of Fin-de-Siecle Paris. United States, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, 2018. The two had signed a marriage contract in August 1876, but they never got married.Macdonald, Hugh. Bizet. United Kingdom, Oxford University Press, 2014. In 1901 he became engaged to a much younger pupil, but it also failed to result in marriage. Delaborde died on 9 December 1913, aged 74, and was buried at

Père Lachaise Cemetery Père Lachaise Cemetery (french: Cimetière du Père-Lachaise ; formerly , "East Cemetery") is the largest cemetery in Paris, France (). With more than 3.5 million visitors annually, it is the most visited necropolis in the world. Notable figure ...

on 11 December.

Compositions

His compositions included a youthful opera ''Maître Martin'', the opéra-comique ''La Reine dort'', the overture ''Attila'', preludes, studies and fantasies for piano (including a ''Grande Fantaise'' on Bizet's '' Carmen''), a piano quintet, and songs. There is also a ''Scherzetto'' for chromatic harp. He also edited some of Alkan's music. Delaborde's output is significant, but minimal attention has been given to his works. The first acoustic recording in history of one of Delaborde's compositions was ''Étude d'après une petite Valse de V. Dolmetsch'', recorded by

Vincenzo Maltempo Vincenzo Maltempo (born July 2, 1985) is an Italian pianist. He was born in Benevento, Italy. He began his musical studies with Salvatore Orlando, disciple of the pianist Sergio Fiorentino, with whom he graduated at S. Cecilia Conservatory in Ro ...

in 2014, as a part of the Rarities of Piano Music at the "Schloss vor Husum" Festival.

Selected other works

* Cadence pour le Finale du concerto pour clavecin en ré mineur de J. S. Bach (1872) * Cadence sur l'Allegro du Concerto en sol, op. 58 de Beethoven. Piano (1878) * Etudes La bémol majeur (1889) * Etudes de concert. Piano. La bémol majeur. No 2 (1872) * Exercices de lecture. Piano. Op. 14, no 4 (1887) * Étude d'après une petite Valse de (1889) * Fantaisies from 'Carmen' Op. 8 .

izet Izet is a Bosnian variant of the Turkish given name '' Izzet'' from Arabiعزة meaning honor, greatness. Alternatively, it may refer to the first sighting of vegetation after volcanic eruptions. It may refer to: * Izet Arslanović (born 1973), B ...

(1879) * Impromptu-valse Ré bémol majeur (1872) * Ouverture d'Attila (4 mains) (1879) * Paraphrase on Bundeslied Op. 122 eethoven(1872) * Petite marche villageoise (1872) * Prélude. Harpe ou piano. Do majeur (1903) * Préludes Op. 13 * Promenade de noctambules (1889) * Scherzetto. Harpe ou piano. Fa majeur (1903) * Transcriptions. Scherzetto. Symphonie. armontel(1879) * Menuet from 'L'Arlésienne'

(1873) * Trois pièces pour harpe chromatique (système G. Lyon) ou piano (1903) * Valse de concert. Harpe ou piano. Ré bémol majeur (1903)

Sources

* Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 5th ed, 1954. * Smith, Ronald (2000), ''Alkan, the Man, the Music'', 2 vols in 1, London: Averill and Kahn.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Delaborde, Elie-Miriam 1839 births 1913 deaths 19th-century French male classical pianists Pedal piano players 19th-century French composers French male composers Burials at Père Lachaise Cemetery Musicians from Paris Conservatoire de Paris faculty Pupils of Franz Liszt