Louis Vierne
Born blind, Vierne partially regained sight at age six. Obvious talent was rewarded with piano and solfège studies, to which were added harmony, violin, and a general course when he entered the Institution National des Jeunes Aveugles in Paris in 1880. There he was befriended by César Franck who, from 1886, gave him private tuition in harmony while including Vierne in his organ class at the Paris Conservatoire. The lessons of the master were not lost on him -- Franck possessed perhaps the richest harmonic palette in Western music and Vierne effortlessly absorbed many of its features. Vierne entered the Conservatoire as a full-time student in 1890. Franck died in November, succeeded by Charles-Marie Widor as professor of organ. Vierne soon became Widor's assistant, a post he continued to hold under Guilmant -- where he taught Dupré and Nadia Boulanger -- and deputized for Widor at St. Sulpice. Vierne took the Conservatoire's first prize for organ in 1894, though his career waited until 1900 to be spectacularly launched when, on May 21, he triumphed over four other organists in a competition for the prestigious post of titular organist at Notre Dame de Paris (its magnificent instrument reconditioned by Cavaillé-Coll) where his audience came to include such luminaries as Clémenceau and Rodin. The Symphony No. 1 for organ (1898-1899) forecasts the succession of moods -- grand and assertively virile, searchingly contrapuntal, effusive, and distressingly confessional -- which would deepen anguishingly in succeeding works, reflecting an unhappy marriage and divorce, professional disappointments, the loss of a son and a brother in the Great War, and a continual battle to retain minimal sight. After being passed over for professorship of the Conservatoire's organ class in 1911, Vierne taught at the Schola Cantorum. His Symphony No. 2 for organ, completed in 1903, drew from no less a critic than Debussy the stunning accolade, "M. Vierne's symphony is truly remarkable. It combines rich musicality with ingenious discoveries in the special sonority of the organ. J.S. Bach, the father of us all, would have been well pleased...." The spate of disturbingly eloquent compositions -- mélodies, piano pieces, chamber works, mass settings, the Symphony in A, and numerous works for organ (including, at last, six symphonies) -- continued to pour forth until his death. Concert tours took him to England in 1924 and 1925, and on to a three-month visit to the U.S. and Canada in 1927. Vierne died of a heart attack at the organ of Notre Dame during a public concert on June 2, 1937.
© TiVo
Discography
12 album(s) • Sorted by Bestseller
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Louis Vierne, Messe Solennelle, Op. 16
Louis Vierne, Francis Bardot, Pierre Pincemaille
Classical - Released by Classical.com Music on Feb 16, 2009
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
The Organ of Canterbury Cathedral
Classical - Released by Dean and Chapter of Canterbury on Oct 1, 1990
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Turbulent Heart
Classical - Released by Melba Recordings on Aug 1, 2009
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Charles-Marie Widor & Louis Vierne: Organ Symphonies
Tobias Frank, Charles-Marie Widor, Louis Vierne
Classical - Released by Rondeau Production on Sep 12, 2011
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Louis Vierne: Symphony No.2 in E for Organ, Op.20
Classical - Released by The Digital Gramophone on Apr 13, 2014
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
The Songs of Louis Vierne
Classical - Released by Deux-Elles Limited on Jul 4, 2005
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Gaston Litaize e Guy Bovet: All'organo di Carasso (Ticino)
Classical - Released by VDE-GALLO on Aug 2, 2012
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Gloria
The Choir of Canterbury Cathedral
Classical - Released by Dean and Chapter of Canterbury on Sep 1, 2010
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Vierne: Carillon de Westminster in D Major, Op. 54, No. 6 (Digitally Remastered)
Classical - Released by EMG Classical on Aug 28, 2015
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
In Flanders' Fields Vol. 60: A Tribute to Frits Celis
Classical - Released by Phaedra on May 27, 2009
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Copenhagen Oratorio Choir
Classical - Released by CDklassisk on Oct 16, 2013
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Joyas de la Música, Vol. 47
Deutsches Symphonie Orchester Berlin, Maria Callas
Classical - Released by Star Evens Digital on Mar 21, 1996
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo