Around the world today, the news is full of stories about bloated government bureaucracies and the inefficiencies of various public agencies.

From France and Italy to the United States, there are persistent calls for governments to become leaner and more effective, beginning with eliminating “waste, fraud and abuse” from various agencies.

But this isn’t a new phenomenon at all. And we can actually go back to a piece of music composed by Florent Schmitt in 1912 to remind ourselves that even in the era before computers and automation, indolent government employees were fair game for satire.

In 1912, Schmitt was engaged to create music to accompany an artistic collaboration between French writer Charles Muller and artist Régis Gignoux, satirizing the “parasitic civil servant.” The revue, titled Mil neuf cent douze (1912), was premiered at the Théâtre des Arts in Paris on April 19, 1912, where, according to an article published in the April 27, 1912 issue of Variety magazine, the production reportedly met with “a fairly moderate reception.”

Noting that “the revue is full of politics,” the Variety article went on to report:

“The music is arranged by Florent Schmitt, and the production is in five acts — each with a series of topical subjects. The third, ‘The Republic After 40 Years,’ has many political skits, while the last is ‘The School of Journalism.'”

Taking the musical material from the original production, Schmitt published a symphonic picture titled Fonctionnaire MCMXII, Op. 74 in 1923, and it received its premiere performance at the Lamoureux Concerts in February 1924, conducted by Paul Paray, who was also the work’s dedicatee.

The composition’s subtitle gives us an additional clue as to the “inspiration” behind the score: Inaction in Music. It turns out that Schmitt’s composition skewers the entire French government worker sector with devastating satire. Or, as musicologist Frédéric Decaune puts it, “It is the bureaucracy itself – the men of regulations – that Florent Schmitt makes to look completely foolish.”

Musicologist Nicolas Slonimsky, in his book Music Since 1900, went further, characterizing the piece as a symphonic skit “deriding old-fashioned bureaucracy … whose slogan was ‘never do today what you can make someone else do tomorrow.'”

Throughout its 15-minute duration, we clearly hear the “inactivity in music” in how it portrays a day in the life of a government worker, who engages in such “worthy” pursuits as:

• Yawning and stretching for a long, long time
• Perfunctorily saluting the French flag in the office
• Eating
• Exclaiming that there’s beaucoup work to do … but then doing nary a thing at all
• Looking endlessly at the clock
• Eedling away on a trumpet (out of tune, of course) to pass the time
• Falling asleep

It’s clear from the above scenario – and in the structure of his highly symbolic score that’s very heavy on “episodics” and light on the full development of musical themes – that the composer had little respect, time or patience for the inefficiencies of French bureaucrats.  One wonders if Schmitt ever had to wait for hours at the French equivalent of the Department of Motor Vehicles … because that alone would have given him inspiration to pen this music!

A report in the February 24, 1927 issue of Musical Courier, published following the premiere concert performance of Fonctionnaire MCMXII, gave this apt description of the piece:

“At the Concerts Lamoureux, we heard an interesting new work by Florent Schmitt titled Fonctionnaire MCMXII: Inaction en musique. It was written to illustrate a text of Régis Gignoux in which is told the tribulations of a clerk, describing ridiculous episodes which fill his daily life until the hour of four, when he takes his fishing tackle and calls it a day.

The score written to this libretto is fantastic, with passages of short duration, intermingled with music-hall ditties and the Marseillaise by way of reminiscence. The instruments are made to contribute to laughter and ridicule — a style in which Florent Schmitt excels.”

I’ve uncovered documentation from several sources about the staging of Fonctionnaire MCMXII that followed Paul  Paray’s premiere concert performance of the piece. A brief mention of it was made by Maurice Bourgeois, a New York Times correspondent in Paris who filed a report on the Parisian theatre scene that was published by the Times on March 20, 1927. In his article, Bourgeois referred to Schmitt’s piece as a “striking musical extravaganza” and reported that it was staged by a troupe run by Mme. Marguerite Bériza at the Théatre Fémina.

About that production, Musical America magazine reported in a March 26, 1927 article that the piece had been performed as a pantomime by the “well-known mimic, [Robert] Pizani.” The article continued: “His pantomime did not serve to clarify very much the music of Florent Schmitt. Still, it was more comprehensible than when performed only in concert.”

A far more detailed account of the staging, written by French music critic Émile Vuillermoz, was published in the April 9, 1927 issue of The Christian Science Monitor. Not only did Vuillermoz give his impressions of the performance, he also provided additional “back-story” information on the composition:

“This work has a singular history. It was written by Régis Gignoux and Charles Muller two years before the war [World War I]. It was a satirical farce intended for the cinema. Florent Schmitt composed the score for it, but naturally no cinematographist has cared to interest himself in a project signed by three “high-brow” artists. The work remained shelved until this year. The score was played with great success some weeks ago at the Lamoureux concerts, and the Beritza Theater decided to produce it in the form of pantomime.

It consists of [a] farce after the style of Alfred Jarry and Courtelina. It is a caricature of the redoubtable being who, in every country in the world, exercises behind his office desk a dictatorship without limit, but tempered by his natural laziness. The official shown us has no other duty than to kill the time that he is obliged to spend in his office. He gives himself up to all sorts of eccentricities with the professional accessories of his work — his knife, pencil or glue-pot. He does exercises with hoops with his leather belt. From time to time he plays the clarion, decorates himself successively with all the degrees of the Legion of Honor and attaches stripes to his sleeve. Thus he reaches the hour of his deliverance, puts on a straw hat and departs majestically, satisfied with duty done.

This scenario, filled with ingenious and amusing details, would have provided Charlie Chaplin with all sorts of grateful opportunities of delighting the audience. Unfortunately, the actor who, in Paris, was given this part turned out to be totally devoid of imagination. From this fact, the production did not give a bit the effect that one counted on, And yet the score of Florent Schmitt is of real value; it shows constant vivacity, lightness and imagination. It is full of amusing inventions and happy turns of rhythm and timbre. It is impossible that a work of this merit will not one day be welcomed by an intelligent cinematographist. For this type of the official is universal and international, and it is certainly not the privilege of France only to possess a specimen of humanity of another age who so often impedes the progress of civilization by perpetuating the anachronistic cult of red-tape formalities.”

The music critic G. Jean-Aubry referenced Schmitt’s piece in a column titled “Music of Laughter” that he wrote on February 14, 1927 for The Christian Science Monitor. In his piece, Aubry noted:

“… The most serious people are often those who, in art, know best how to express merriment or laughter …

Florent Schmitt has recently completed a composition for the theatre which has been given only in orchestral form up to the present. It is a kind of ballet, or according to the French sense of the word, a ‘pantomime’; it bears the strange title of Fonctionnaire MCMXII, and is nothing more than the burlesque description of an official’s day, as seen by one somewhat disrespectful of governmental institutions. It goes without saying that this official’s time is devoted to anything but his business … 

It is some sort of unbridled clownishness which would require an actor such as Charlie Chaplin, whose peculiar genius might very well be the origin of this comic scene — the more as especially as Fonctionnaire MCMXII was first intended for film …

The time spent on a comic work temporarily frees the artist of certain formulae, places him on a different level and gives to his art a sort of elasticity, if one may say so, from which future dramatic works can benefit … It can thus be at least useful practice … instructive and useful for us also, because they are efforts which someday should bring about the birth of a musical work with a durable charm of comical color.”

Fonctionnaire 1912 is not a well-known piece, even though it boasts plenty of Schmitt’s trademark colorful orchestral palette. I am aware of just one recording – made back in the 1980s on the Cybelia label – which is long out of print.

That’s a pity, because the Cybelia recording, featuring the Rhenish State Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by James Lockhart, is quite fine.

Those with an interest in studying the music score are in luck, however, as it is readily available from Presto Classical and several other sources.  And the Lockhart recording is available to hear on YouTube (accessible to viewers  in the United States only, unfortunately).

Of particular interest to French speakers, the Lockhart recording is also available in the original version with spoken voiceover, featuring the winsome Vincent Figuri narrating the pathetic activities listed above.  (Even better, this upload is accessible everywhere in the world, thanks to Philippe Louis’ very worthy YouTube music channel).

To my mind, Fonctionnaire MCMXII is a composition that several of today’s Schmitt champions could do a fine job in resurrecting – among them conductors Leon Botstein, Stéphane Denève, JoAnn Falletta, Fabien Gabel and Yan-Pascal Tortelier.  Who’s game?