This website is using cookies. By continuing to browse the site, you are agreeing to our use of cookies. Find out more.

Romantic

Baroque

Classical

Romantic

20th century

21st century

Solo repertoire

Piccolo

Alto flute

Bass flute

Bonis Mel

Akimenko, Theodore

Albeniz, Isaac

Andersen, Joachim

Barnett, John Francis

Bazzini, Antonio

Beach, Amy

Bellini, Vincenzo

Bizet, George

Blahetka, Leopoldine

Blodek, Wilhelm

Boehm, Theobald

Bonis, Mel

Borne, François

Brahms, Johannes

Briccialdi, Giulio

Bruch, Max

Caplet, André

Chaminade, Cécile

Chopin, Frédéric

Danzi, Franz Ignaz

Debussy, Claude

Demersseman, Jules-Auguste Edouard

Donizetti, Gaetano

Donjon, Johannes

Doppler, Albert Franz

Du Puy, Édouard

Dvořák, Antonin

Elgar, Edward

Fauré, Gabriel

Foote, Arthur

Franck, César

Frühling, Carl

Fürstenau, Anton Bernhard

Gade, Niels Wilhelm

Ganne, Louis

Génin, Paul Agricole

German, Edward

Glière, Reinhold

Godard, Benjamin

Gounod, Charles

Grandval, Clémence

Hahn, Reynaldo

Hüe, Georges Adolphe

Hummel, Johann Nepomuk

Jadassohn, Solomon

Kohler, Ernesto

Kreisler, Fritz

Kuhlau, Friedrich

Lefebvre, Charles Edouard

Liszt, Franz

Maier, Amanda

Massenet, Jules

Mendelssohn, Fanny

Mendelssohn, Felix

Mercadante, Saverio

Meyer-Olbersleben, Max

Molique, Wilhelm Bernhard

Morlacchi, Pietro

Mouquet, Jules

Nielsen, Carl

Paganini, Niccolo

Périlhou, Albert

Pierné, Gabriel

Popp, Wilhelm

Rabboni, Giuseppe

Reger, Max

Reichert, Matthieu Andre

Reinecke, Carl Heinrich Carsten

Ries, Ferdinand

Rietz, Julius

Rossini, Gioacchino

Saint-Saëns, Camille

Sarasate, Pablo de

Schubert, Franz

Schumann, Clara

Schumann, Robert

Sibelius, Jean

Silcher, Friedrich

Strauss, Richard

Taffanel, Claude Paul

Tulou, Jean-Louis

Vitali, Tomaso Antonio

Wagner, Siegfried

Widor, Charles Marie Jean Albert

Piece for flute and piano, Op. 189

By Bonis Mel

Mel Bonis: Piece for flute and piano, Op. 189 was written in 1936, just one year before the composer's death.
Some older sheet music introductions broadly estimate its style as belonging "around 1900," but modern research and recording catalogs consistently date it to 1936.
The work was "rediscovered" and popularized for modern audiences in the late 20th century, with its first major modern publication appearing in 2000 by Éditions Kossack.

In 1936, Mel Bonis was 78 years old and in declining health. She was living in a state of relative isolation in Sarcelles, near Paris. Around that time, she was particularly interested in writing accessible but expressive pieces that bridged the gap between Romanticism and modern French styles.
Her late works are often interpreted as a refuge from a life of personal struggle: specifically, her forced marriage to Albert Domange and the social scandal of her illegitimate daughter, Madeleine. Pièce reflects a post-Romantic, nearly Impressionistic serenity, utilizing a beautiful melody over slow, atmospheric piano chords.

Francesca Arnone

Terry Lynn Hudson (piano), 2014, MSR Classics / Orchard

Piece

00:00
YouTube icon

Bonis Mel

Bonis, Mel (1858 - 1937) was a French female composer (Mélanie Hélène Bonis).
Born in Paris into a middle-class working and religious family without any musical background Mélanie was strongly influenced by strict Catholic values and traditions throughout her life.
She self-taught piano at an early age and didn't have any formal musical education until the age of 18 when a family friend Henri Maury, a cornet professor at the Paris Conservatory presented her to César Franck who accepted her as a piano student. She gradually excelled as a pianist and even more as an accompanist and was praised over some other students like Claude Debussy but gained a reputation as too fearful and having severe stage fright problems.

In 1881 when she started establishing herself as a composer she realized that her gender might be a problem to succeed. Therefore from then on she signed her works as Mel Bonis. Later that year she was proposed by singer Amédée Landely Hettich but received harsh disapproval from her parents, forcing her to resigned from the Conservatory as well and take a job as a seamstress. Two years later she married a wealthy widower, pleasing her parents and freeing her time for composing again.

In 1899, Bonis joined the Société des Compositeurs de Musique, and eventually became secretary in 1910.
This important opportunity allowed her to be in contact with leading composers of the period and from 1900-1914 marked a period of most important works composed by Mel Bonis, including the Sonate pour flûte et piano of 1904.

During the World War I she significantly reduced her work as a composer, mostly writing for her grandchildren. From 1922 until her death in 1937 she resumed to compose more, creating predominantly spiritual works.

Overall Mel Bonis composed over 300 works from which six compositions was written for flute and piano: Sonate pour Flûte et Piano, Op. 64.; Air Vaudois pour Flûte et Piano, Op. 108; Andante et Allegro pour Flûte et Piano, Op. 133; Une Flûte Soupire pour Flûte et Piano, Op. 121; Pièce pour Flûte et Piano, Op. 189; and Scherzo (Final) pour Flûte et Piano, Op. Posth. 187.