Francis Bayer
1938 - 2004
French
Biography
French composer and musicologist Francis Bayer was born on July 11th 1938 in Calvados. He began his life of study at the University of Paris, studying philosophy, in which he gained a PhD, before deciding to devote his life to musical composition. He studied at the Ecole Normale de Musique in Paris with Henri Dutilleux in 1970. Apart from his work as a composer, Francis Bayer taught aesthetics, musical analysis, instrumentation and orchestration from 1971 in the Music Department of the University of Paris where he had a number of very successful students. In addition to this, he authored a number of studies published in a variety of publications, including the important theoretical work From Schoenberg to Cage. Of his major works, the most important are Outlook for solo cello, composed in 1991, and Prelude to the night for Orchestra, composed between 1992 and 1996 as well as a series of Proposals, a series of eight pieces for different ensembles. He died in Paris on January 2nd 2004.