Description

LUCIENNE EVA LOUISE JUSTINE RADISSE (FRENCH:  LUCIENNE-EVA-LOUISE-JUSTINE RADISSE; DECEMBER 4, 1899, NEUILLY-SUR-SEINE – JANUARY 17, 1997, PARIS)

Lucienne Radisse was the daughter of the fashionable men’s tailor Édouard Radisse and his wife, who founded a girls’ school in Vitry-sur-Seine. All four of their daughters, including Lucienne, graduated from the school and studied music.

She began studying the cello at the age of five and entered the Conservatory of Versailles at eleven. After graduating in 1913, she played for a time in the orchestra of the Odéon Theatre in Paris, then continued her studies at the Paris Conservatory with Cros Saint-Ange and André Ecking, graduating with honors in 1918. In 1920 she married the officer and writer Jean Fannius, with whom she had two sons, born in 1921 and 1922.

Radisse’s popularity in the mid-1920s was closely linked to her frequent appearances on France’s first commercial radio station, Radiola (renamed Radio Paris in 1924). She also gave concerts at leading French resorts such as Monte Carlo, Biarritz, and Trouville. In 1923, together with Nathalie Jourdan-Morange and Sigismond Jaretsky, she became the first performer of Roland-Manuel’s String Trio. She appeared with the family piano trio—including a tour of Tunisia, Algeria, and Morocco with her sisters Nathalie and Madeleine—performed with the string quartets of Lucien Capet and Joseph Calvé, and collaborated with orchestras conducted by Philippe Gaubert, Walter Straram, and Henri Busset. Busset dedicated two works for cello and piano to her: Élégie and Chant (Op. 52, Nos. 1 and 3).

In 1933, following her divorce from her first husband, Radisse married Busset’s son, Yves, who became her impresario. Throughout the 1930s she toured extensively worldwide, visiting forty-three countries in ten years. During this period, she also made several recordings with her sister Nathalie and the pianist Jean Doyen. In 1932 she appeared in film, playing the role of the protagonist’s girlfriend in The Imposter, directed by Henri Blanc and André Luguet.

With the outbreak of World War II, Radisse interrupted her musical career and spent several years working as a volunteer ambulance driver. In the second half of the 1940s she resumed concert activity, performing particularly frequently in the United States. From 1953 onward, for approximately fifteen years, she served as an assistant in André Navarre’s cello class at the Paris Conservatory. Her final concert tour took place in 1975, in Central Africa.

TRACKLIST

1. Arlequin (Popper) Odeon 166. 070 Ki 1537, Paris 1928-02-04
2. Elegie Tristesse de Dulcinée (Massenet) Gustave Cloëz, piano Odeon 166.067, Paris 1928-01-26
3. Gavotte (Lully) Jean Doyen, piano Odeon 166. 223 Ki 2659, Paris 1929-10-17
4. Le chant du soir (Schumann) Gustave Cloëz, piano Odeon 166.066 Ki 1495, Paris 1928-01-26
5. Prélude (Corelli) Jean Doyen, piano Odeon 166. 223 Ki 2658, Paris 1929-10-17
6. Romance sans paroles (Faure) Gustave Cloëz, piano Odeon 166.066 Ki 1496, Paris 1928-01-26