Joseph Franck

Jean Joseph Hubert Franck (born October 31, 1825 in Liège ; † November 20, 1891 in Issy-les-Moulineaux near Paris) was a Belgian-French organist, pianist, violinist and composer .

Live and act

Joseph Franck was the younger brother of César Franck and should become a violinist according to the will of his authoritarian father. In 1833 he was accepted into François Prume 's class at the Liège Conservatory and only two years later he gave the first public concerts with his brother. After the family moved to Paris in 1837, both brothers began their studies at the same time at the Paris Conservatory , and Joseph received lessons from François-Antoine habeneck . However, their father quickly forbade them to continue attending the Conservatory so that they could devote themselves to concerts. It was not until 1849 that Joseph Franck took up lessons again on his own initiative and studied piano and organ. In 1850 he received his final diploma (Premier Prix) in counterpoint and fugue theory in the class of Adolphe Adam and in 1852 the Premier Prix in organ playing in the class of François Benoist . In the 1850s, Joseph was more successful than his brother César. In 1852 he followed Charles Gounod as organist and conductor of the Église des Missions Étrangères , a position which he gave up in 1855 in favor of the organist position at the church of Saint Thomas d'Aquin . In 1861 he became titular organist at Notre-Dame d'Auteuil .

During the same period he gave numerous concerts, both at home and abroad, as an organist, pianist or violinist. As a composer he dedicated his Op. 1, a collection of motets, the Belgian King Leopold I . He was supported by Gioacchino Rossini , to whom he dedicated his first piano concerto in 1857 out of gratitude. On the occasion of the wedding of Princess Charlotte of Belgium with Archduke Maximilian of Austria , who later became Emperor of Mexico, he composed a cantata for four solo voices and a large orchestra.

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Like his brother, he campaigned for the reintroduction of Gregorian chant . To this end, he published the treatise L'Art d'accompagner le plain-chant de huit manières différentes in 1856 . In total, Joseph Franck left an oeuvre of more than 200 compositions, around half of which are church works. Some works, such as the Gallop March , which he composed in 1889 for the inauguration of the Eiffel Tower , prove his humor. The Bach lover composed six preludes and fugues for the organ . In the area of ​​chamber music he created two trios for violin, cello and piano. For piano, he wrote a collection of studies that was published by the Conservatory in 1857.

Individual evidence

1. ^ François-Joseph Fétis : Biographie universelle des musiciens et bibliographie génèrale de la musique (1862)
2. ↑ Thierry Levaux: in Le Dictionnaire des Compositeurs de Belgique du Moyen Age à nos jours , p 253, Editions: "Art in Belgium" in 2004, ISBN 2-930338-37-7