Born just weeks after the completion of the Eiffel Tower and the opening of the great Paris Exposition of 1889, Marcel Moyse would seem destined for a performing career perfectly synchronous with the birth of the modern age, one of the richest artistic periods in France. From his early days as a member of the Ballets Russes orchestra, Moyse went on to play solo flute in Paris's major orchestras, ride the crest of the new chamber music wave, star in the burgeoning recording industry, and rule the flute class of the peerless Paris Conservatoire.

Despite the brutal effect of World War II on his Paris career, Moyse created a second professional life in the increasingly dynamic American music world as a master teacher; with Rudolf Serkin and Adolf and Hermann Busch he was a founder of the Marlboro Music School and Festival, and he became a dominant influence on American flutists--indeed, on many performers of other instruments, for what he really taught was not how to play the flute buy how to make music.

Marcel Moyse: Voice of the Flute is the first full biography of this legendary figure. Drawing on her five years of scholarly research and well over one hundred interviews with European and American students, colleagues, and family members of Moyse, author Ann McCutchan traces his career, with particular attention to the cultural and political conditions that helped mold him, his colleagues, and his followers on both sides of the Atlantic. She distills a truthful and full portrait of this charismatic, complex and sometimes puzzling man. The book includes photographs and other materials from the Moyse Archives and the Estate of Marcel Moyse.

AMADEUS PRESS

Reinhard G. Pauly, General Editor