William Christie

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William Christie, 2014

William Lincoln Christie (born December 19, 1944 in Buffalo , New York ) is an American-born French conductor and harpsichordist .

Life

William Christie studied piano, organ and harpsichord with Ralph Kirkpatrick and musicology with Elliot Forbes at Harvard and Yale . In 1969 and 1970 he taught Dartmouth College , in Hanover, New Hampshire , where he also directed the University's Collegium Musicum . Inspired by his teacher Ralph Kirkpatrick, he began to be interested in French culture and moved to Paris in 1971. He continued to take harpsichord lessons with Kenneth Gilbert and David Fuller and eventually became a harpsichordist in the Concerto Vocale Gent, founded in 1977 by René Jacobs .

In 1979 Christie founded the ensemble Les Arts Florissants , named after a stage work by Marc-Antoine Charpentier , which plays on historical instruments and replicas and is mainly devoted to baroque music. One of Christie's most important achievements is the style-appropriate revival of French baroque music, in particular several operas by Lully and Rameau , as well as works by Monteverdi and Purcell . There are numerous recordings of these and also of Handel operas and oratorios . Christie was very successful in choosing his soloists and ensemble members, because excellent and successful artists such as Agnes Mellon , Guillemette Laurens , Sandrine Piau , Isabelle Poulenard, Véronique Gens , Noémi Rime, Guy de Mey, Paul Agnew, Bernard Deletré, Christophe Rousset , Hugo Reyne and numerous other singers and instrumentalists helped him to his success and / or began their career with Les Arts Florissants.

Between 1982 and 1995 Christie taught historical performance practice at the Paris Conservatory . Beginning in the fall semester of 2009, Christie was visiting professor for some time in the Juilliard Historical Performance Program at the Juilliard School in New York City.

honors and awards

In 1995 Christie became a French citizen and became a member of the Legion of Honor . In 2008 he was elected to succeed Marcel Marceau in the French Académie des Beaux-Arts and was officially introduced in January 2010.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Stanley Sadie : Christie, William (Lincoln) entry in Grove Music Online
  2. Brief résumé of Christies, with reference to his work at the Julliard School ( Memento from November 7, 2016 in the Internet Archive )