Paul Dukas

The French composer Paul Dukas is most famous for his colourful orchestral showpiece, L’apprenti sorcier (The Sorcerer's Apprentice, 1897). Highly self-critical, he allowed relatively few of his compositions to be performed and published, yet as a composer and teacher he inspired many of the greatest composers of the next generation, including Stravinsky and Messiaen. Born in Paris in 1865, he studied at the Conservatoire alongside Debussy, who later had some influence on his enchanting full-scale opera Ariane et Barbe-bleue (1907). In Dukas’ earlier Symphony in C (1896), the then-prevailing influences of Franck and Wagner can be heard, yet its slow movement’s beguiling melodiousness—while to some extent recalling Rimsky-Korsakov—reveals a distinctive voice. Dukas also edited Rameau’s 18th-century operas and paid tribute to that composer in his skillful Variations, interlude et finale sur un thème de Rameau (1903) for piano. His last major work was the ballet La Péri (1912); its sweet yet off-kilter style anticipating the organ works of his pupil Messiaen. Dukas taught at the Conservatoire de Paris until his death in 1935.