Gavoty Bernard (Georges Marie)

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Gavoty Bernard (Georges Marie)

Gavoty, Bernard (Georges Marie), French writer on music and organist; b. Paris, April 2, 1908; d. there, Oct. 24, 1981. He studied philosophy and literature at the Sorbonne, and organ and composition at the Cons, in Paris. In 1942 he became organist at Saint-Louis des Invalides in Paris. Under the nom de plume Clarendon, he was music critic of the Paris newspaper Le Figaro from 1945 until his death. He publ. a series of lavishly illustrated monographs on contemporary celebrated musicians under the general title of Les Grands Interpretes (Geneva, 1953–55), and also made documentary films on famous musicians.

Writings

(all publ. in Paris unless otherwise given): Louis Vierne: Vie et I’oeuvre (1943); Jehan Alain, musicien frangais (1911–1940) (1945); Les Francis sont-ils musiciens? (1948); Souvenirs de Georges Enesco (1955); with J.-Y. Daniel-Lesur, Pour ou contre la musique moderne? (1957); La Musique adoucit les moeurs (1959); with É. Vuillermoz; Chopin amoureux (1960); Dix grands musiciens (1963); Vingt grand interprétes (Lausanne, 1967); L’Arme à gauche (1971); Parler, parler! (1972); Chopin (1974); Reynaldo Hahn: Le Musicien de la belle époque (1976); Alfred Cortot (1977); Anicroches (1979); Liszt: Le Virtuose, 1811–1848 (1980).

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire