Jean Langlais Remembered
Years of Improvement !CHAPTER!2!! !!Years!!of!!Improvement!(193041935)!! ! ! The Amis de l’Orgue competition - Lessons with Tournemire Fresh from the Conservatory, 23 years old, Jean Langlais had no idea that he would participate in a great movement to renew the twentieth century French School of the organ. To be sure, the pioneers (Franck, Widor, Guilmant, Dupré, Vierne, Tournemire, Marchal) had fought to change a 19th century situation compromised by the mediocrity of its taste and its organ technique. By the quality of their compositions, improvisations, and performances, these pioneers won over a public until then sparse and lukewarm, for whom the organ was too often synonymous with the noise at the end of the Mass. The main task remained: to release the organ from the circles in which it was confined, which meant first of all, from the closed circle of the church. In 1930, the French School of the organ already shone and the young generation, that of Duruflé, Messiaen, Alain, Langlais, and Litaize, supported by their elders, was soon to play a leading role. This road to success was facilitated by the 1927 formation of the organization called “Les Amis de l’Orgue” (Friends of the Organ), founded by Count Bérenger de Miramon Fitz-James and the young organist-musicologist Norbert Dufourcq, with the encouragement and support of musicians such as Widor, d’Indy, Pierné, Vierne, Tournemire, Dupré, and Marchal. Its goals were to bring together and assist organists, particularly the youngest ones. Already in 1924, the musicologist Jean Huré, who had started a monthly journal named L’Orgue et les organistes, was complaining both about the public and musicians in fairly strong language: The organ is little known by our composers; it is little known to the musical public.
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