Klarinet Archive - Posting 000039.txt from 1994/02

From: James Langdell <James.Langdell@-----.COM>
Subj: Re: Cyrille Rose Studies
Date: Fri, 4 Feb 1994 16:07:05 -0500

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Date: Tue, 1 Feb 1994 10:43:41 GMT+1
Margaret Stone <STONEMA@-----.UK> wrote:
>I bought the second volume of a book of 80 studies for the clarinet
>about 4 years ago, and since then I have been searching music
>shops for any music by Cyrille Rose (I think the spellings right) She
>writes studies,but they are very musical pieces too, and the kind of
>thing you could play and people would enjoy listening to them. I find
>that usually studies are too technical for non-musical people to enjoy
>hearing, but Cyrille Rose manages to make her music very melodic. I
>would like to have any information about her, her music and where I
>could get it. I think she composed about the same time as Jean
>Xavier Lefevre, or maybe a bit later. I don't really know anything
>else, but I would like any info, really.

Rose, though handicapped by being male, was an excellent transcriber
of studies for the clarinet. Here's a biographical sketch from an
inexpensive single volume that includes most of his works:

ROSE, Cyrille (1830-1903) studied clarinet at the Conservatoire
Nationale de Musique in Paris with Hyacinthe Klose. At the age
of seventeen, he won the coveted Premire Prix. In 1976, at age
forty six, he succeeded A.M. Leroy as professor of clarinet at
the Conservatoire. Among his students were Paul Mimart, Henri
and Alexamdre Selmer, Henri Lefebvre, E.H. Stievenard, Paul
Jeanjean, and Louis Cahuzac. Rose worked with Buffet to perfect
the bore design of the clarinet.

The source for this information is:

Artistic Studies for Clarinet
Book 1 - From the French School
edited by David Hite
SMC B-362, 1986
Southern Music Company
San Antonio, Texas 78292

The music in this collection consists of the complete "40 Studies"
and "32 Studies" along with nine of Pierre Rode's violin "Caprices"
transcribed by Rode. This edition is the first I've seen that
identifies the source of each of Rose's transcriptions, and provides
biographical sketchs of the original composers.

I don't know of any original compositions by Rose, but between
the covers of this set of works that were published under his name
is some of the nicest music ever aimed at the clarinet.

I once stitched together excerpts from Rose's etudes and studies to
provide musical accompaniament for a reading of Oscar Wilde's story
"The Happy Prince." I'll try to write up a roadmap through the text
and the music if anyone would like see it or give it a try.

P.S. Margaret, if this information disappoints you with the loss
of Rose as a female 19th century clarinettist/composer role model,
check out the history and works of Caroline Schleicher and
of Augusta Holmes.

--James Langdell jamesc@-----.com
Sun Microsystems Mountain View, Calif.