Robert Caby (Venette, March 25, 1905 - Paris, October 3, 1992) was a French composer and writer. Caby was engaged in writing art critics and political articles, arranging concerts, creating surrealistic drawings and dealing with rare books and paintings. He had a wide circle of friends who were important musicians and artists of the time including Erik Satie,

Darius Milhaud Darius Milhaud (; 4 September 1892 – 22 June 1974) was a French composer, conductor, and teacher. He was a member of Les Six—also known as ''The Group of Six''—and one of the most prolific composers of the 20th century. His compositions ...

Pablo Picasso Pablo Ruiz Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and Scenic design, theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. One of the most influential artists of the 20th ce ...

, Francis Poulenc, Charles Koechlin and

Henri Sauguet Henri-Pierre Sauguet-Poupard (18 May 1901 – 22 June 1989) was a French composer. Born in Bordeaux, he adopted his mother's maiden name as part of his professional pseudonym. His output includes operas, ballets, four symphonies (1945, 1949 ...

. In 1950, Caby joined Anne Terrier Laffaille and Marcel Despard to form Groupe Melos. The group adopted Satie's motto "our music is guaranteed playable." Its manifesto stated "enough intellectual esthetics, enough scholarly edanticism down with modern music, down with music for technique's sake, long live music for the people!" Supported by Poulenc and Sauguet, Groupe Melos presented one concert, then faded away. In the mid-1960s he spent a considerable amount of time at the

Bibliothèque nationale A library is a collection of materials, books or media that are accessible for use and not just for display purposes. A library provides physical (hard copies) or digital access (soft copies) materials, and may be a physical location or a vi ...

, doing research and arrangements of Erik Satie's unpublished works from sketchbooks. In cooperation with

Salabert Francis Salabert (born François-Joseph-Charles Salabert, 27 July 1884 – 28 December 1946) was an innovative and influential French music publisher, who was the head of Éditions Salabert in the first half of the twentieth century. Biography ...

he had all of them published posthumously, leading to an awakening public interest in the composer. Caby wrote almost 900 works, songs being in majority, with lyrics mostly by famous poets such as

Guillaume Apollinaire Guillaume Apollinaire) of the Wąż coat of arms. (; 26 August 1880 – 9 November 1918) was a French poet, playwright, short story writer, novelist, and art critic of Polish descent. Apollinaire is considered one of the foremost poets of t ...

. Some of his greatest influences were Erik Satie, Emmanuel Chabrier, Claude Debussy,

Ludwig van Beethoven Ludwig van Beethoven (baptised 17 December 177026 March 1827) was a German composer and pianist. Beethoven remains one of the most admired composers in the history of Western music; his works rank amongst the most performed of the classic ...

and

Franz Schubert Franz Peter Schubert (; 31 January 179719 November 1828) was an Austrian composer of the late Classical and early Romantic eras. Despite his short lifetime, Schubert left behind a vast ''oeuvre'', including more than 600 secular vocal wo ...

. In 1947 Marianne Oswald performed some of his chansons in a French radio broadcast. In 1959 the first phonogram record was produced — Jacques Douai performing the song "Belle Belle". It was only in 2001 that a second recording appeared — Olof Höjer performing a wide selection of piano works.

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External links

The Lied and Art Songs Texts Page created and maintained by Emily Ezust

1905 births 1992 deaths 20th-century classical composers French classical composers French male classical composers 20th-century French composers 20th-century French male musicians {{france-composer-stub