Maurice Yvain

Maurice Yvain was among the most popular operetta composers of the 20th century, hitting his peak in the 1920s and '30s. In addition, he composed film music for works by several of France's leading directors. Yvain was born in Paris on February 12, 1891. His father was a trumpeter with the Orchestre de l'Opéra Comique, and he grew up with music in the house. Yvain enrolled at the Conservatoire de Paris in 1903, studying with the virtuoso piano-composer Louis Diémer and the composer Xavier Leroux. He had strong piano skills and added popular music to his education as a pianist at the Casino d'Évian, the Casino de Monte Carlo, and the avant-garde Cabaret des Quat'z'Arts in Paris. Yvain's career was interrupted by military service from 1912 to 1919. After his discharge, he began writing songs, light orchestral music, film music, and finally, operettas and musicals. In the army, he had met singer Maurice Chevalier, who introduced him to the single-named singer-actress Mistinguett. She had a hit with Yvain's Mon Homme in 1920 (the song was revived by Barbra Streisand in 1968), and his career was launched. Mistinguett performed many other Yvain compositions, and his work was particularly associated with her in the 1920s. The soundtrack of the roaring 1920s in Paris consisted, in substantial part, of Yvain's music. He began to write operettas in the early '20s and scored a hit with the satirical Ta bouche ("Your Mouth") in 1922. That was popular enough to spawn the sequels Pas sur la Bouche ("Not on the Mouth") and Bouche a Bouche ("Mouth to Mouth"), both in 1925. In the 1930s, Yvain's popularity became international; his operettas were translated into German and were also presented on Broadway, where several of his songs were incorporated into the popular Ziegfeld Follies musical revue. Mon Homme was included in the 1936 film The Great Ziegfeld. Yvain also wrote film soundtracks for leading French directors, including Henri-Georges Clouzot and Anatole Litvak. Much theatrical life in Paris was suspended during the German occupation in World War II, but after the war, Yvain resumed his activities, producing one of his most successful operettas, Chanson Gitane ("Gypsy Song," 1947). His last theatrical production was Le Corsaire noir ("The Black Corsair," 1958), although he resurfaced in 1964 with a television musical, Pierrots des Alouettes. In 1962, he published a memoir, Ma belle opérette ("My Beautiful Operetta"). Yvain died in the Paris suburb of Neuilly-sur-Seine on July 27, 1965.
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