Pierre Cochereau


Pierre Eugène Charles Cochereau was a French organist, improviser, composer, and pedagogue.

Biography

Pierre Cochereau was born on 9 July 1924 in Saint-Mandé, near Paris. In 1929, after a few months of violin instruction, he began to take piano lessons with Marius-François Gaillard. Marguerite Long became his piano teacher in 1933, and three years later, Paul Pannesay. In 1938, Cochereau was introduced to the pipe organ by Marie-Louise Girod, a student of Marcel Dupré. He continued his organ studies with André Fleury and Paul Delafosse, whom Cochereau succeeded as titular organist at St. Roch in Paris in 1942.
After one year of law studies, Cochereau decided to dedicate himself to a musical career, and entered the Conservatory of Paris in 1943. He left the Conservatory in 1949 with first prizes in harmony, music history, fugue and counterpoint, composition, and organ.
In September 1948, Cochereau made his first recital tour to Hungary. One year later, he married Nicole Lacroix, a pianist and composer, with whom he had two children: Jean-Marc, conductor and late director of the Tours Conservatory, and Marie-Pierre, a professional harpist.
In 1949, at age 26, Pierre Cochereau was appointed director of the Le Mans Conservatory, where he stayed until 1956. In 1955, he succeeded Léonce de Saint-Martin as titular organist at Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris.
In 1956, his recording of Marcel Dupré's Symphonie-Passion, Op. 23 was awarded the Grand Prix du Disque. The same year, Cochereau made his first of 25 recital tours to the United States.
In 1961, Cochereau became director of the Nice Conservatory, which he left in 1979, accepting the directorship of the Lyon Conservatory.
Pierre Cochereau died on 6 March 1984 in Lyon after suffering from a cerebral hemorrhage. He was buried at the Cimetière Belleville in Paris.
Pierre Cochereau had a worldwide reputation as a concert organist and especially as a brilliant improviser. In his improvisations, Cochereau had created a musical language that was eminently personal, recognizable as of the opening notes. Stylistic influences regarding counterpoint, formal structure, and harmonic language, included composers such as Marcel Dupré, Maurice Duruflé, Noël Gallon, Olivier Messiaen, and Florent Schmitt.
As a composer, Cochereau left several organ works, chamber music, and choir compositions. Many of Cochereau's organ improvisations were transcribed and published.
In 2012 Anthony Hammond published, with the University of Rochester Press, a book on Pierre Cochereau – the first full-length English language study of him, written with full assistance and support from the Cochereau family and former colleagues.

Compositions

Organ solo