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Barrere Georges
Aitken, Robert
Amirov, Fikret
Amlin, Martin
Amram, David
Andriessen, Jurriaan
Arnold, Malcolm
Arrieu, Claude
Auric, Georges
Babbit, Milton
Bacchus, Peter
Bacri, Nicolas
Baker, Michael Conway
Baksa, Robert
Barber, Samuel
Barrere, Georges
Bartók, Béla Viktor János
Baton, René-Emmanuel
Beaser, Robert
Bennet, Richard Rodney
Berg, Gunnar
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Bernofsky, Lauren
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Bolling, Claude
Bon, Maarten
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Nocturne for flute and piano
Nocturne for flute and piano
Georges Barrere: Nocturne for flute and piano was written in 1913 and dedicated to Mrs. Frederic S. Coolidge (Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge). Coolidge was the most influential patronesse of chamber music in the United States. Barrère’s dedication was both a gesture of professional respect and a strategic move within the New York musical elite, as he frequently performed for her festivals.
The piece was published in 1913 by G. Schirmer in New York.
Nocturne most likely was premiered by Barrère himself since he
frequently performed his Works in New York during the 1913–1914 season with his ensemble, the Barrère Ensemble of Wood Winds.
The piece is a quintessential "night piece", marked by a tranquil, flowing accompaniment and a soaring, expressive flute melody, as well as a salon piece that captures the bridge between 19th-century lyricism and 20th-century impressionism.
In 1913, Barrère was expanding his influence beyond the orchestra pit. Having moved from France to the U.S. in 1905 to join the New York Symphony Orchestra under Walter Damrosch, by 1913, he was a dominant figure in American chamber music.
1913 was the year of the scandalous premiere of Stravinsky's Rite of Spring in Paris. While the avant-garde was exploding in Europe, Barrère’s Nocturne remained a bastion of the French Impressionist style, characterized by "fluid melodic lines and delicate, shifting harmonies."
Barrère was a key advocate for the silver flute in the U.S. during this year. The Nocturne was written specifically to showcase the shimmering, vocal-like quality of the silver Boehm-system flute that he had popularized.
Barrere Georges
Georges Barrere (1876–1944) was a transformative figure in the history of the flute, credited with single-handedly transplanting the "French Flute School" to the United States and popularizing the silver flute over its wooden predecessor.
Born in Bordeaux, France, he entered the Paris Conservatory at age 14 in the class of Paul Taffanel. His early life in Paris was defined by the bohemian artistic circles of the Belle Époque, which deeply influenced his sophisticated and witty musical personality.
A star pupil of Paul Taffanel at the Paris Conservatoire, Barrère won the First Prize in 1895. He was the flutist who premiered the solo in Claude Debussy’s Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune in 1894, a moment often cited as the birth of modern flute playing.
In 1905, he moved to New York, at the invitation of Walter Damrosch, to become the principal flutist of the New York Symphony Orchestra. For four decades, he remained a dominant force in American orchestral and chamber music.
He pioneered the wind quintet and small chamber orchestra movements in the U.S. through the Barrère Ensemble of Wood Winds and the Barrère Little Symphony.
As a professor at the Juilliard School and the Institute of Musical Art, he taught a generation of American masters, including William Kincaid, who became the "grandfather" of the next generation of American flutists.
He was a tireless advocate for contemporary composers, commissioning and premiering over 200 works. In 1935, Barrère famously premiered Edgard Varèse’s Density 21.5 on the world’s first platinum flute, custom-made for him by William S. Haynes.
While primarily known as a virtuoso performer, Barrère was a refined composer of the French Impressionist tradition. His compositions, such as the Nocturne (1913) and Chanson médiévale, are characterized by their elegance, flowing melodic lines, and subtle harmonic colors.