“The true face of Florent Schmitt”: Music scholar and author Émile Vuillermoz describes a composer he knew for more than 60 years.

When Florent Schmitt died in August 1958 at the age of nearly 88 years, his fellow composer Henri Dutilleux penned this memorable epitaph: “Florent Schmitt was the last of that great family to which Ravel, Dukas, and Roussel belonged. He remains one of them who, by a happy assimilation of German and Central European influences, […]

Beyond Salomé: Florent Schmitt’s Other Biblical Ballet (Danse d’Abisag — 1925)

One of the lesser known of Florent Schmitt’s “orientalist” works is Danse d’Abisag, Opus 75.  This work, which was composed in 1925, began life as a choreographic work but soon migrated to the concert hall. In creating the orientalist works upon which so much of his fame rests, Schmitt derived inspiration from historical, biblical and fictional events.  Danse […]