Daniel Lesur


Daniel Jean-Yves Lesur was a French organist and composer. He was the son of the composer Alice Lesur.

Biography

Born in Paris, he entered the Conservatoire de Paris at age 11, studying solfège with Emile Schwartz, harmony with Jean Gallon, and composition with Georges Caussade. He also took private lessons in piano with Armand Ferté and composition with Charles Tournemire. From 1935 to 1964, he was professor of counterpoint at the Schola Cantorum under director Nestor Lejeune, becoming director himself in 1957.
In 1936, he co-founded the group La Jeune France along with composers Olivier Messiaen, André Jolivet and Yves Baudrier, who were attempting to re-establish a more human and less abstract form of composition. La Jeune France developed from the avant-garde chamber music society La spirale, formed by Jolivet, Messiaen, and Daniel-Lesur the previous year.
That same year he, together with Jean Langlais and Jean-Jacques Grunenwald, gave the first performance of Olivier Messiaen's La Nativité du Seigneur.
Between 1927 and 1937 he seconded Tournemire at the organ of Ste. Clotilde, Paris, and was organist of the Benedictine Abbey of Paris, 1937–44. Daniel-Lesur also served as director of the Opéra National de Paris from 1971 to 1973.
His opera Andrea del Sarto received the composition prize of the City of Paris in 1969. In 1973, he received the Prix Samuel Rousseau of the Académie des Beaux Arts. In 1982, he was elected member of the Institut de France.
He died in Paris.

Selected compositions

Stage
  • Andrea del Sarto, opera in 2 acts
  • Ondine, opera in 3 acts
  • La Reine morte, not dated
Orchestral works
  • Suite française
  • Passacaille for piano and orchestra
  • Pastorale for chamber orchestra
  • Variations for piano and string orchestra
  • Ouverture pour un festival
  • Concerto da camera for piano and chamber orchestra
  • Sérénade for string orchestra
  • Intermezzo
  • Symphonie de danses
  • Symphonie 'd'ombre et de lumière
  • Nocturne for oboe and string orchestra
  • Fantaisie concertante for cello and orchestra
Chamber music
  • Suite for oboe, clarinet, and bassoon
  • Suite for string quartet
  • Suite en trio for violin, viola, cello and piano
  • Suite médiévale for flute, harp, violin, viola, cello
  • Sextuor for flute, oboe, violin, viola, cello, harpsichord
  • Élégie for two guitars
  • Nocturne for oboe and piano
  • Novelette for flute and piano
  • Marine for harp
  • Lamento for violin and piano
  • Stèle à la mémoire d'un héros for flute and string quartet
Piano music
  • Soirs
  • Bagatelle
  • Pavane
  • Le Bouquet de Béatrice for piano 4-hands
  • Pastorale varié
  • Ballade
  • Nocturne
  • Le Bal
  • 3 Études
  • Fantaisie for 2 pianos
  • L'Armoricaine
  • Contre-fugue for 2 pianos
  • Berceuse sur le nom de Schostakovitch
  • Chanson à danser
Organ works
  • Scène de la passion
  • La Vie intérieure
  • In paradisium
  • Hymnes
  • Quatre Hymnes
Choral works
  • Annonciation, cantata for speaker, tenor, mixed chorus and chamber orchestra
  • Le Cantique des cantiques for 12 voices and chorus
  • Cantique des colonnes for female voices and orchestra
  • Encore un instant de bonheur
  • numerous folksong arrangements
Songs
  • Les Harmonies intimes
  • La Mort des voiles
  • La Mouette / Les Yeux fermés
  • Quatre Lieder, several versions
  • Trois Poèmes de Cécile Sauvage
  • Deux Chansons de l'étoile de Seville
  • L'Enfance de l'art
  • Chansons cambodgiennes
  • Berceuses à tenir éveillé
  • Les Amants séparés
  • Dialogues dans la nuit for mezzo-soprano, bass, and chamber orchestra
  • ''À la lisière du temps / Le Voyage d'automne / Permis de séjour''

    ''Le Cantique des cantiques''

Daniel-Lesur's best-known composition is the a cappella choral work Le Cantique des cantiques, a setting for 12 voices of parts of the Song of Songs, interspersed with Latin verses and New Testament texts. The seventh and final movement, titled "Épithalame", utilizes "the combination of richly harmonised upper voices singing the famous words from Chapter 8 of the Song of Songs in French over an ostinato set to Latin words has very great cumulative power, reaching a mighty twelve-part climax where all the voices sing a succession of Alleluias which initially emerge from the complex texture in a repeated motif coloured by the Lydian mode – an idea which seems to suggest the joyous pealing of bells." The Cantique des cantiques has been recorded by Harry Christophers and The Sixteen, and is frequently performed internationally by such groups as Chanticleer and the Santa Fe Desert Chorale.