Marie-Claire Alain
Marie-Claire Alain was the youngest child in a family of distinguished musicians, born August 10, 1926, in St. Germain-en Laye, a Paris suburb. Her father, Albert Alain, a composer and amateur organ builder, had been a pupil of Guilmant and Fauré. Her sister Odile was a promising soprano and pianist who lost her life early in a mountaineering accident; her older brother, Olivier, was a composer, pianist, and musicologist. Her oldest brother was the renowned Jehan Alain, a composer and organist whose teachers included Dupré, Dukas, and Jean Roger-Ducasse. He numbered Messiaen and Poulenc among his closest friends and his works for organ -- Litanies, in particular -- established him as one of the brightest stars among rising French composers in the decade before his battlefield death in 1940, at 29. A twin sense of loss and inheritance informed her studies and career.
With the allied liberation of Paris in August 1944, she entered the Paris Conservatoire, studying with Dupré for organ, Pié-Caussade for counterpoint and fugue, and Maurice Duruflé for harmony. Duruflé composed one of the finest of his small but masterly group of organ works as an hommage to Marie-Claire's brother, the Prélude et fugue sur le nom d'Alain, Op. 7 (1942). She studied with Duruflé from 1944 until 1950, schoolwork being augmented by private lessons. During her Conservatoire years, she carried off four Premier Prix. After the inauguration of her career in 1950, she took a prize for organ at the Geneva International Competition and gave her first public recital. The Amis de Orgue awarded her the Bach Prize in 1951. After a further two years of study with Gaston Litaize, she took up her career in earnest, giving well over 2000 recitals worldwide. Her recordings number in the hundreds, and she thrice recorded the complete organ works of Bach. By the 1980s, she had become known as a specialist in 17th and 18th century music, with numerous recordings of works by Couperin, Grigny, Daquin, Vivaldi, Buxtehude, Pachelbel, Handel, C.P.E. Bach, Haydn, and Mozart -- among many others -- to her credit. But she also made distinguished recordings of Romantic repertoire with albums of works by Mendelssohn, César Franck, Liszt, Widor, Vierne, Poulenc, and Jehan Alain -- whose punctilious execution is suffused with passion -- carrying into the 21st century living traditions extending to the middle of the 19th. She was also much in demand as a teacher.
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Bach: Complete Organ Works (Analogue Version 1959-67, remastered 2018)
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics em 24 de ago. de 2018
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Lebègue & Marchand: Pièces pour orgue (À l'orgue de l'église Notre-Dame de Caudebec-en-Caux)
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics em 17 de fev. de 2023
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bach, JS : Complete Organ Works [1980]
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics International em 1 de jan. de 1986
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Marie-Claire Alain in Concert at Notre-Dame in Paris
Classical - Lançado por Solstice em 1 de fev. de 2021
24-Bit 192.0 kHz - Stereo -
Poulenc: Concerto pour orgue & Concert champêtre
James Conlon, Marie-Claire Alain, Ton Koopman, Rotterdams Philharmonisch Orkest
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics em 1 de jan. de 1986
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bach: Orgelbüchlein, Preludes and Fugues & Fantasias (At the Organ of the Laurenskerk in Alkmaar)
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics em 17 de fev. de 2023
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Franck: Grandes œuvres pour orgue (À l'orgue de l'église Saint-Étienne de Caen)
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics em 9 de abr. de 1996
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Orgues du Jura franco-suisse, Vol. 2
Marie-Ange Leurent, Eric Lebrun, Olivier Camelin, Frederic Champion, Marie-Claire Alain
Classical - Lançado por Phaia Music em 16 de jun. de 2017
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Christmas Organ Music
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics International em 1 de jun. de 1988
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bach : Organ Works
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics International em 1 de jan. de 1990
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Handel: Organ Concertos
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics em 4 de out. de 2019
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Saint-Saëns: Symphonie No. 3 avec orgue, Le rouet d'Omphale & Danse macabre
Jean Martinon, Marie-Claire Alain, Orchestre National de France
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics em 1 de jan. de 1971
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Alain: L'œuvre pour orgue, vol. 1. Litanies, Trois danses, Intermezzo (À l'orgue de la cathédrale Saint-Christophe de Belfort)
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics em 19 de jun. de 2020
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Alain: L'oeuvre pour orgue (The Complete Organ Works)
Classical - Lançado por Intrada em 16 de mai. de 2007
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bach: Organ Masterpieces, Vol. 1
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics International em 1 de jun. de 1988
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bach: Complete Organ Works (Analogue Version - 1959-67)
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics em 24 de ago. de 2018
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Une vie pour l'orgue
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics em 24 de fev. de 2023
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bach: Clavier-Übung III, Leipzig Chorales & Preludes and Fugues (At the Organ of the Martinikerk in Groningen)
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics em 3 de fev. de 2023
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Franck : Organ Works (- Apex)
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics International em 29 de fev. de 1996
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Daquin: Noëls pour orgue (Aux grandes orgues de la cathédrale Saint-Théodorit d'Uzès)
Classical - Lançado por Warner Classics em 10 de jun. de 2022
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Concerts au grand orgue de Saint-Étienne-du-Mont à Paris
Marie-Claire Alain / Thierry Escaich / Daniel Roth / Vincent Warnier
Classical - Lançado por Intrada em 1 de jan. de 2006
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo