Félix Clément (musician) – Wikipedia

Félix-Jacques-Alfred Clément is an organist, composer, musicologist and teacher of old French music, born on January 13, 1822 in Paris where he died the January 23, 1885 .

Attracted very young by music, her parents force him to follow studies at Henri-IV and Saint-Louis high schools to enter the normal school. Forced to practice a daily piano hour, he discreetly learned harmony and composition from Moncouteau, then a substitute organist of Saint-Sulpice. This religious music was going to decide on his orientation and, at thirteen, he already composed a mass which will be executed by the choristers of the Orpheon of Paris. During his studies, he will regularly play the organ at Notre-Dame de la Pitié.

Having entered as a tutor in a rich Norman family, Clément is fortunate to meet music lovers who help him to get into the composition and to deepen the song that will become his specialty. In 1840, he was placed as a tutor at Viscount Benoist d’Azy. Three years later, he was convinced of his musical vocation. He was appointed professor of piano and singing at Stanislas college where he was the organist and the chapel master until 1860.

Passionate about ancient music and, in particular, by religious music, he engaged in research on the history of music and poetry. He contributed from 1847 and for ten years to the magazine Archaeological annals . In 1849, he was responsible for the music of official solemnities of the appointments of the magistracy in the Sainte-Chapelle and those of the exhibition of the industry. He took the opportunity to perform music from handwritten scores of XIII ^{It is} century and published under the title “Songs of the Sainte-Chapelle”. This restitution attracted a series of severe criticism including that of his colleague Théodore Nisard. Called to the Ministerial Commission of ” Religious arts and buildings “, Clément dedicates all his efforts to a better renovation of church organs and the more truthful execution of liturgical songs. The success of this company favored the foundation of a specific school that Louis Niedermeyer directed in 1853.

We owe Félix Clément, many erudition works. He was also very busy, apart from his educational functions, by his numerous attributions as master of chapel: first, of the Stanislas college, then Saint-Augustin, Saint-André d’Antin, Louis-le-Grand and the Sorbonne.

• Eucologe in music according to the Parisian rite (1845; 1851): First application of a modern rating system of the plain-chant.
• The Roman parishioner (1854): liturgical plains in modern notation.
• Complete component method ; Plain-Chain paintings (1854): rules of Gregorian chant.
• Pieces of religious music (1855); Cantics collection, with organ support (1859).
• Various reforms of the Gregorian chant (1860) [ read online ]
• General History of Religious Music (1861).
• Christian poets from the fourth century until the fifteenth (1857).
• Felix Clement , Famous musicians from the sixteenth century to the present day , Paris, L. Hachette, 1868 , 680 p. ( read online ) On Google Books.
• Felix Clement and stone Larousse , Dictionary of operas: lyric dictionary , Paris, administration of the Grand Dictionnaire Universel, 1881 ( read online ) , read online on French (in collaboration with Pierre Larousse and reissued in 1999).
• History of music from ancient times to the present day (1885).

• Joseph D’ortigue: Music in church (Didier, 1861)
• François-Joseph Fétis: Universal biography of musicians and general bibliography of music (1866)
• Archaeological review (Leroux, 1850)
• Archaeological annals (Didron, 1852)

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• Notice in a generalist dictionary or encyclopedia :