Martin, Frank

Frank Martin
(b. Geneva, 15 September 1890 — d. Naarden, 21 November 1974)

Ouverture en Rondeau

Preface
Frank Martin was a Swiss pianist and composer born in Geneva in a Huguenot family as the youngest of ten children. His father Charles was a Calvinist minister.

Although he did not receive any musical education, he already composed some complete songs at the age of eight. The most important event in Martin‘s childhood was attending the performance of St. Matthew Passion by Bach, a work, that made a very deep impression on the eleven year old boy. This performance influenced his view on composition view for a long time, and J.S. Bach remained his model for his own musical work. Martin had only one music teacher, Joseph Lauber (1864 – 1953) who taught him piano, harmony and composition. Piano was not the first instrument that Martin studied. Earlier he learned violin, an instrument, that he abandoned very soon, confessing the preference for piano because of his interest in harmony and the harmonic potential of a keyboard. The interest for the vertical organisation of sound remained in him for rest of his creative life. After having having lessons in classical languages at highschool, Martin began to study mathematics and physics at the University of Geneva where he attended the courses for only two years, then abandoning this path. His decision to enrol himself at a university was only due to his parent’s wish.

After 1918 Martin moved away from Geneva and to live in Zurich, Rome and Paris. In 1926 he returned in Geneva where he founded the “Société de Musique de Chambre de Genève” which he led as a pianist and harpsichord player for ten years. In the same year, he met Emil Jaques-Dalcroze when he visited a congress on rhythmic musical education. Martin started to attend a class at the Institute Jaques-Dalcroze as a student, but after two years, he became a teacher for rhythmic theory and improvisation at the same institute where he worked closely with its founder and director. Simultaneously, he taught chamber music at the conservatory and was the artistic director of the private school Technicum Moderne de Musique from 1933 to 1940. Between 1943 and 1946 he served a the president of the Swiss Association of Musicians. Soon all these musical activities began to clash with his work as a composer. Martin needed peace and concentration so he decided to leave Geneva for Netherlands, where he arrived on 1946. After ten years spent in the centre of Amsterdam, he moved to the little town of Naarden where he had his own house. From 1950 to 1957 he held a composition class at Staatliche Hochschule für Musik in Cologne. During his life, Martin travelled all over the world performing his compositions. His reputation is reflected in many prizes and honours (Prix de compositeur de l’Association des Musiciens Suisses, Docteur honoris causa de l’Université de Genève, Prix de Genève, Grosser Kunstpreis des Landes Nordrhein-Westfalen, Ehrenmitglied der Wiener Konzerthausgesellschaft, Accademico Onorario di Santa Cecilia, Roma, First Prize Philadelphia Orchestra award, Docteur honoris causa de l’Université de Lausanne, Membre Associé Honoraire de la Société des Arts de Genève, Accademico Onorario di Accademia Filarmonica Romana, Grand Prix des Semaines Musicales Internationale de Paris and many more) which he received between 1947 to 1974. Soon his works came to enjoy a firm place in the repertories of orchestras and choirs. Martin was married three times in his life.

In 1758 the Ouverture en Rondeau was performed for the first time under the baton of Ernest Ansermet at the Kunsthaus in Lucerna. In May 1973 he conducted the world premiere of his Requiem. Martin died in Naarden on 21 November 1974, and was buried in Geneva at the Cimetière des Rois. …

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