Description

HENRI GIL-MARCHEX (SAINT-GEORGES-D’ESPÉRANCHE, DECEMBER 16, 1892 – BOULOGNE-BILLANCOURT, 22 NOVEMBER, 1970)

 

 

 

 

He was born Henri Gilles on December 16, 1892 (the French musicologist Frédéric Gaussin has established that his birth year was not 1894, as is widely published). He changed his name in 1918, upon marrying Jeanne-Alice Marcheix, adapting the spelling of both their surnames to Gil-Marchex. His parents came from prosperous and respected families, a distinction that extended far back in his lineage: Henri was the great-great-great-great-grandson of Denis Diderot (1713–1784), the French philosopher, art critic, writer, and co-founder, chief editor, and contributor to L’Encyclopédie.

Gil-Marchex entered the Paris Conservatoire at the age of nine, where he studied piano under Louis Diémer while the institution was under the direction of Gabriel Fauré. In Diémer’s class, he won a Premier Prix in 1911. His musical activity was prodigious: as a touring artist, he traveled more kilometers worldwide than Alfred Cortot (though Cortot gave more concerts), performing throughout Europe, Egypt, the USSR, Indonesia, the Philippines, and North and South America. He was the first French pianist to perform and lecture in Japan, undertaking four tours between 1925 and 1937—an experience that had a lasting influence on his own music, as reflected in some of his compositions.

An early and ardent champion of Maurice Ravel’s music, Gil-Marchex enjoyed the composer’s reciprocal esteem: Ravel referred to him as “one of my best friends and best performers,” and he was the only pianist whom Ravel permitted to arrange one of his works. Gil-Marchex composed a paraphrase on the fox-trot from L’Enfant et les sortilèges, which he premiered in Tokyo in 1925. He was also the pianist in the first performance of Tzigane, given in London on April 26, 1924, with the violinist Jelly d’Arányi, to whom the work was dedicated. In addition, works were dedicated to him by several composers, including Georges Auric and Albert Roussel.

His repertoire was vast, ranging from 18th-century harpsichord music to works by his contemporaries, as well as his own compositions. At the time, he was the only French pianist to perform publicly Schoenberg’s Klavierstücke, Prokofiev’s Visions fugitives, Szymanowski’s Études, Op. 33, and major works by Bartók and Stravinsky. Despite his extraordinary activity and long life—he died in 1970—his recorded legacy is remarkably small. He recorded only once, in 1927, setting down 42 sides of 78-rpm discs for the Columbia label between October and December of that year. Most were rejected or destroyed, leaving only a handful that were issued; these were already almost entirely out of print by 1930–31 and have since remained exceedingly rare.

 

 

TRACKLIST

 

Etude en do majeur Op. 10 No. 1 (Chopin) Columbia WL 630

Moment musical en fa mineur Op. 94 No 3 (Schubert) Columbia WL 629

Prélude en do majeur Op. 28 No 1 (Chopin) Columbia Columbia WL 630

Prélude en fa majeur Op. 28 No 23 (Chopin) Columbia WL 629

Prélude, 2e Livre, No 3  La Puerta del vino (Debussy) Columbia D 14055 WL 658

Préludes, Livre I, No 12  Minstrels (Debussy) Columbia 14055 WL 655

Sonate en do majeur K. 159 (L. 104) (Scarlatti) Columbia D 14053 WL 790

The flowing ribbon (Couperin) Columbia WL 644 5215

Troisième livre de Pièces de clavecin (1728) Suite en sol majeur, Menuet I et II (Rameau) Columbia  2354-D WL 791