Essential Franck
Born in the Belgian town of Liège in 1822, César Franck was a piano prodigy before turning to composition after moving to Paris in 1835. He later became celebrated largely as an organist, but his works, composed for much of his life away from the limelight, proved influential to the next generation of French composers and beyond.
Read more…Franck's music was initially reminiscent of lighter styles popular in Paris but soon also showed the influence of Wagner, as well as of the techniques of organ improvisation of which he was such a master (Liszt, upon hearing him 1866, compared him to Bach). His middle period was dominated by large-scale religious works, including 'Les Béatitudes', which he took a decade to complete. His strongly flavoured musical language became yet more distinctive in his later works. These included Symphonic Poems composed during the 1870s, later chamber music and the celebrated Symphony in D minor (1888). This met with incomprehension at its first performance and employs an innovative 'cyclic form', whereby melodic ideas recur throughout different sections or movements of a work.