Francis Planté

Francis Planté (born March 2, 1839 in Orthez , Département Pyrénées-Atlantiques , † December 19, 1934 in Saint-Avit , Département Landes ) was a French pianist who was called le Dieu du piano by his contemporaries .

Life

At the age of four, Francis Planté had piano lessons with Madame Saint-Aubert, a pupil of Franz Liszt . In January 1849 he entered the Paris Conservatory as a student of Antoine François Marmontel , where he won first prize in the piano as early as 1850. Gioacchino Rossini invited him to concerts in his salon, where he met musicians such as Liszt, Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy , Sigismund Thalberg , Charles Gounod and Charles Marie Widor . In the following years he often appeared as a chamber musician with the violinist Jean-Delphin Alard and the cellist Auguste-Joseph Franchomme , a former chamber music partner of Chopin .

In 1858 he returned to the Conservatory and studied composition and harmony there. He then withdrew from the concert business for about ten years in order to compose himself. In 1872 he returned to the concert stage and performed publicly until his wife's death in 1908. He made particular contributions to the distribution of Robert Schumann's works in France.

Planté was not only famous as an excellent piano virtuoso, but also as an eccentric. His concerts, which usually lasted between three and six hours, had no previous programs and he often interrupted them to explain musical details to the audience.

In 1928 Planté made a series of recordings for French Columbia at his home in Mont-de-Marsan . Besides Vladimir de Pachmann, he is the only contemporary of Chopin who has made electrical recordings.

Individual evidence

Web links

Commons : Francis Planté - collection of images, videos and audio files

personal data
SURNAME	Planté, Francis
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	French pianist
DATE OF BIRTH	March 2, 1839
PLACE OF BIRTH	Orthez
DATE OF DEATH	December 19, 1934
Place of death	Saint-Avit (Landes)