Roger Calmel (13 May 1920 – 4 July 1998) was a French

composer A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. Etymology and def ...

. His nearly 400 works span every genre, from

chamber music Chamber music is a form of classical music that is composed for a small group of Musical instrument, instruments—traditionally a group that could fit in a Great chamber, palace chamber or a large room. Most broadly, it includes any art music ...

opera Opera is a form of History of theatre#European theatre, Western theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by Singing, singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically ...

Early life

Originally from the

Languedoc The Province of Languedoc (, , ; ) is a former province of France. Most of its territory is now contained in the modern-day region of Occitanie in Southern France. Its capital city was Toulouse. It had an area of approximately . History ...

, he undertook his first musical studies in

Béziers Béziers (; ) is a city in southern France. It is a Subprefectures in France, subprefecture of the Hérault Departments of France, department in the Occitania (administrative region), Occitanie Regions of France, region. Every August Béziers ho ...

, in particular with Paul Fouquet. In 1944, he moved to Paris to study composition at the

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

school, before entering the Paris conservatory and winning first prize in several classes as of Counterpoint and Fugue (Plé-Claussade Class), Aesthetic class (Oliveir Messiaen class) and Composition class (Darius Milhaud class). His training benefited also from Pierre Shaeffer's influence. The next few years witness the birth of his first major works. His personal musicality stood up through an atonal essence language that renounces neither

polytonality Polytonality (also polyharmony) is the musical use of more than one key (music), key simultaneity (music), simultaneously. Bitonality is the use of only two different keys at the same time. Polyvalence or polyvalency is the use of more than one di ...

nor tonal pivot usage. He won the Musical Grand Prize of Paris (1958), the First Prize of the Concerts-Réferendum-Pasdeloup, the First Prize of the French musical confederation (1959), the Grand Prize of the Divonne Composition International Competition (1960), and the Grand Prize of the French Institute of chamber music (1976). For many years Roger Calmel taught at French Radio and Television children's choir school, before becoming the head of the Darius Milhaud music conservatory in the XIVth arrondissement in Paris. From 1991 to 1998, he worked as an inspector in Ateliers Musicaux for the Paris council. Those pedagogic activities had, without any doubts, an influence on the musician's career. Since then, and following the requests made by the "A Coeur joie" movement, Pueri Cantores and many other festivals and choirs, he spent a large part of his time writing several works based on vocal music. Over many years, he also acted as artistic director of the Côte Languedocienne festival, a festival that he set up in Sérignan.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Calmel, Roger 1920 births 1998 deaths French male composers 20th-century French composers 20th-century French male musicians