Francois Prume

Francois Prume (Francois Hubert Prume) was a Belgian violinist and composer born (in Stavelot, Belgium) on June 3, 1816.  Nicolo Paganini was then 33 years old and Beethoven, though he didn’t know it at the time, had another ten years to live.  Prume was a highly gifted and accomplished violinist who came on the scene, made an impression, and then left almost without leaving a trace.  According to one source, he began his violin studies at age 3.  His father was the organist at Stavelot.  At age 5, he began studying at the nearby town of Malmedy, in the Province of Liege, a French-speaking section of Belgium.  From 1827 to 1830, he studied at the Royal Conservatory of Liege (the Liege Conservatory.)  He then studied for two years with Francois Habeneck (Director of the Paris Opera) at the Paris Conservatory.  After graduation in 1832, he returned to Liege and was immediately appointed professor of violin at the conservatory.  He was 17 years old.  His most famous pupil was probably Hubert Leonard, though Leonard probably only studied privately with Prume since he (Leonard) began his studies at the Brussels Conservatory in the same year (1832) that Prume returned to Liege.  Prume was only 3 years older than Leonard.  In 1839, Prume toured Russia, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Hungary, Germany, Holland, and Belgium.  In 1844, he played in Paris and in that same year was made head of the violin department at the Liege Conservatory.  He was 28 years old.  He continued touring and teaching during his entire career.  It has been said that he played with Franz Liszt on several occasions.  One source claims that he was totally blind for the last few years of his life.  Prume wrote six violin studies, a violin concerto, and a few concert pieces for his own use but which were also probably published during his lifetime.  His most famous piece is La Melancolie for violin and piano (or orchestra) which Camillo Sivori (one of Paganini’s pupils) was very fond of playing.  Leopold Auer mentioned that piece in his book on violin pedagogy.  Prume died on July 14, 1849, after a very short illness, at age 33.  

Hubert Leonard

Hubert Leonard was a Belgian violinist, teacher, and composer born (in Bellaire) on April 7, 1819.  He is mostly remembered for having taught – for almost 20 years - at the Brussels Conservatory where Charles De Beriot, between 1843 and 1852, had also taught.  Leonard later settled in Paris where he continued to teach privately.  Among his most celebrated students were Henry Schradieck and Martin Marsick.  As a child, he began his studies with his father and even gave a public concert before entering  the Brussels Conservatory in 1832, at age 12.  From age 9, he had also been studying privately with an obscure teacher surnamed Rouma - this is probably one and the same as Francois Prume, another Belgian violinist who at age 17 (1832) was already professor of violin at the Liege Conservatory and who was only 3 years older than Leonard.  Leonard enrolled in the Paris Conservatory in 1836 where his principal teacher was Francois Habeneck.  He was 17 years old.  Funding for his studies came from a wealthy merchant.  He left the conservatory in 1839 but stayed in Paris where he was employed by the orchestras of the Variety Theatre and the Opera Comique.  He toured through various European cities from 1844 to 1848.  A single source gives a different date for this event in Leonard’s life (1845.)  In Leipzig, he met Mendelssohn who briefly tutored him in composition.  Leonard also learned Mendelssohn’s concerto and played it on tour.  The concerto had just then recently been premiered in 1845 by Ferdinand David but Leonard was the first to play it in Berlin with Mendelssohn on the podium.  Leonard began teaching at the Brussels Conservatory in 1848 (Grove’s Dictionary says 1847), at age 29, but continued to tour sporadically, extending his tours as far as Norway and Russia.  After quitting the conservatory in Brussels in 1866, he again settled in Paris, where he spent the next 24 years.  Leonard’s compositions include five (or six) violin concertos, duos for violin and piano, a cadenza for the Beethoven concerto, fantasias, salon pieces, and etude books for violin, including a book entitled 24 classic etudes.  I am not certain but I’m pretty sure the concertos have never been recorded.  Supposedly, Leonard once said “The bow is the master, the fingers of the left hand are but his servants.”  Leonard died in Paris on May 6, 1890, at age 71.  He had owned a G.B. Guadagnini (1751), an Andrea Guarneri (1665), and two Magginis, one of which went to his widow, who sold it in 1891.  

Edouard Lalo

Edouard Lalo (Edouard Victoire Antoine Lalo) was a French violinist, composer, and teacher born (in Lille, France) on January 12, 1823.  Some sources – in fact, most sources – give his date of birth as January 27, 1823.  Today, he is not remembered as a violinist, but rather, as the composer of the famous violin concerto, Symphonie Espagnol (1874, opus 21), a work which every concert violinist learns and plays and, if they are lucky, records.  It has been said that his marriage to one of his young pupils when he was 42 inspired him to write the Symphonie, though it actually was not written until nine years later.  In fact, he composed nothing between the year he got married (1865) and 1873, the year he wrote his violin concerto in F.  As a child, Lalo studied violin, cello, and piano at the Lille Conservatory.  He left home at age 16 and entered the Paris Conservatory.  His father then disowned him because he was firmly opposed to the idea that the teenager Lalo should make music his profession.  Nevertheless, Lalo stuck it out and paid for his tuition at the Paris Conservatory by giving lessons and playing in ensembles.  At the conservatory, his violin teacher was Francois Habeneck, one of the foremost violinists and conductors of the day.  Lalo made his living by only playing and teaching privately until about age 50, when he seriously entertained the idea of composing large-scale works.  He had already been composing chamber music for many years prior to this but his reputation as a composer was slowly acquired.  He formed the Armingaud Quartet in either 1848 or 1855 (sources vary) in which he played viola at first then second violin.  Chamber music in France was not much appreciated until about the late 1800s but Lalo’s quartet helped change that.  Early works of his were a Fantasy for violin and piano (1848, opus 1), a piano trio (1851, opus 7), and a violin sonata (1853, opus 12.)  Among his major compositions are three symphonies, two violin concertos, a cello concerto, an opera, a ballet, and a piano concerto.  Other than the Symphonie Espagnol and the cello concerto, none of these works is ever performed, except perhaps in France.  However, the premiere of his opera in 1888, was a huge success for Lalo.  Trio Oriens can be seen and heard on YouTube playing Lalo's first trio and Lynn Harrell can be heard playing the cello concerto here.  According to a usually-reliable source, Lalo owned and played a 1700 Matteo Goffriller violin. Only God knows where it is now. Lalo died on either April 22 or April 23, 1892, at age 69.  

Francois Habeneck

François Antoine Habeneck was a French violinist, composer, and conductor born on January 22, 1781 (Mozart was about 25 years old and would only live another ten years.) He was initially taught by his father (what else is new?), and by the age of ten was already playing in public. In 1801, he entered the Paris Conservatory. In the same year, he joined the orchestra of the Opera Comique, but shortly afterwards moved to that of the Opera. In 1817 (at age 36), Habeneck succeeded Rodolphe Kreutzer as concertmaster at the Opera, and in 1821 he became its director, a position which he held until 1846. During that time, he conducted the premiere performances of many operas. In 1828, Habeneck became the founding conductor of the Paris Conservatory Orchestra. By means of this orchestra’s concerts, he introduced Beethoven’s symphonies to a French audience. Paganini once commented, after playing a concert at which Habeneck conducted the accompaniment, that he had the best orchestra in all of Europe. He composed two concertos, small violin pieces, and several songs. Habeneck also wrote a violin method book which was published in 1835. That book curiously incorporates some of Viotti's writings on violin study which, up to that time, had remained unpublished.  In that particular fragment, Viotti (1755-1824) advises strongly that the study of scales should be given great emphasis, something which Paganini, Sivori, Ysaye, and Heifetz also emphasized and recommended for daily practice.  Habeneck died on February 8, 1849, at age 68. A famous Stradivarius violin bears his name. I’ll try to locate a picture of it.