Maurice Martenot

Pierre Vellones and Martenot (seated, 1936)

Maurice Martenot (born October 14, 1898 in Paris , † October 8, 1980 in Clichy ) was a French musician and inventor who developed the Ondes Martenot, one of the most popular analog electronic musical instruments.

Live and act

Maurice Martenot studied cello and piano with Alfred Cortot at the Paris Conservatory . During the First World War he was employed as a radio operator, from the noises heard during this activity he derived the idea of ​​using them in music. After meeting Leon Theremin in 1923, he began working on an electronic musical instrument. He patented the first model of his instrument as Perfectionnements aux instruments de musique électriques on April 2, 1928, and it became known as Ondes musicales or Ondes Martenot .

On April 20 of the same year, the instrument was presented to the public for the first time in a performance of Dimitrios Levidis ' Poeme Symphonique under Rhené baton at the Paris Opera . Martenot developed several variants of the instrument, including one on which micro- intervals could be played and a smaller instrument called the ondioline .

Martenot played his instrument himself a. a. at a performance of the Philadelphia Orchestra under Leopold Stokowski . The most important interpreter on the instrument became his sister Ginette Martenot in the 1930s . At the World Exhibition in Paris in 1937 he received the Le Grand Prix de l'Exposition Mondiale . From 1947 he taught Ondes Martenot at the Paris Conservatory.

In 1949 Martenot was made a knight and in 1975 an officer of the Legion of Honor . Musicians such as Edgard Varèse , Olivier Messiaen (including Turangalîla Symphonie , Fete Des Belles Eaux for six Ondes Martenot and Trois Petites Liturgies de la Presence Divine ), Darius Milhaud , Arthur Honegger , Pierre Boulez (quartet for Ondes Martenot, 1945) composed for his instrument , Maurice Jarre , André Jolivet and Charles Koechlin .

Web links

• Website about Martenot and his invention