FONTYN Jacqueline (1930)

Biography

Jacqueline Fontyn (Antwerp, 1930) is a composer, music teacher, conductor and pianist. Thanks to her long and versatile career, she is called the Grande Dame of Belgian composers. Fontyn’s work is non-conformist, her pieces breathe freedom and a cosmopolitan worldview. She is not afraid of improvisation or aleatory (chance). Although she is familiar with Schoenberg’s twelve-tone technique, she only worked with it in her early years. “Too academic,” according to Fontyn. Her favorite composer is Bach, but she was also influenced by Mozart, Haydn, Lutoslawski and Roussel.

Fontyn received her first piano lessons at the age of five from Ignace Bolotine, who immediately put her on the path of improvisation. After further training with Marcel Maas, she started taking lessons in instrumentation, music theory and composition with Marcel Quinet in Brussels in 1947. After a few years, Quinet advised her to breathe in “different musical air” and so in 1954 she ended up with Max Deutsch in Paris via Nadia Boulanger. Two years later, Fontyn left for Vienna to study orchestral conducting with Hans Swarowski for six months. She completed her education with a three-year course at the Royal Queen Elisabeth Chapel in Waterloo.

Fontyn’s professional life started in 1963 at the Antwerp Conservatory where she taught counterpoint. In 1970 she moved to the Brussels Conservatory to teach counterpoint and composition. After her retirement in 1990, she held teaching positions at the universities of Georgetown and Maryland. She has given masterclasses in large parts of the United States, Egypt, Korea, Taiwan, China and Israel. In the meantime, she collected a long series of awards. The Prix de Rome (1959), Queen Elisabeth Composition Prize (1964), Prix Jeunesses Musicales de Belgique (1967) and the Arthur Honegger Prize (1987) stand out. Jacqueline Fontyn mainly works on commission and has her own music publisher, Perform our Music (POM).

Work review

Capriccio (1954) is her first work for piano that was influenced by Max Deutsch. It is written in twelve-tone technique, albeit in Fontyn’s characteristic free, undogmatic style. She interprets the expanded tonality flexibly. In a recording with Robert Groslot (piano), carefree tripping alternates with furious crescendos in the low registers and short legato passages that appear unexpectedly warm. Classical tonality remains within reach with harmonic triads and slightly dissonant diphthongs. The dynamics in this piece underline Fontyn’s curiosity and optimism.

She also requires this curiosity from the listener. This is evident, for example, from Filigrane (1969), her first composition for harp and flute. Also for the first time, the composer refrains from using a fixed time signature. The result is that the flautist and the harp player have to find each other and that the listener has little to hold on to at first. This improvisation that remains within limits is typical of her approach. In interviews, Fontyn stated that she is not in favor of open forms, because she does not want to relinquish her ultimate responsibility for the work. With Ephémères (1979) for mezzo-soprano and orchestra, Fontyn turns to the use of modes, albeit again with a personal touch. The piece consists of six short parts and is inspired by the poetry of the Antwerp poet Robert Guiette. His poems exude discreet mysticism with a touch of humor here and there. In Ephémères, Guiette’s poetics appear to fit in well with Fontyn’s musical aesthetic. In a CD recording with Mahler specialist Lucienne Van Deyck, the solemn serenity of the first movement is followed by a dialogue between the bassoon and the singer in which doubt and uncertainty predominate. This makes way for passion that is fueled by spectacular twists and turns in the trills of the strings, supplemented with timpani and trombones. The fourth movement describes the nocturnal nature in which clarinet and triangle dance with the bouncy soprano, as if insects want to demonstrate their right to exist. Arnold Schönberg, who was taught by Fontyn’s teacher Max Deutsch, listens emphatically. The motif gradually slides into a litany about the lost opportunities in this life. The ending is sparse, with a declamatory ending. In Méandres (2009), a septet for wind instruments, strings and percussion, Fontyn shows where she is now. This composition is an embroidery of trills, a velvety gong, a sparkling triangle and airy walking melodic motifs. The gong suggests the starting point of a musical journey. The entries that follow are short playful rotating motifs of low strings and woodwinds, joined together by piano and vibraphone. Flute and piccolo suggest bird sounds. Apparently the listener has left for a boat trip on a winding river in the Amazon. Latino percussion, long rests and timpani translate the rumors of the jungle. Here and there an accordion appears, which is rather surprising in a room full of people. Double stops and trills of the high strings sound like undulating swarms of insects that then suddenly linger when toneless pizzicati are played. It is Jacqueline Fontyn through and through: new possibilities, unusual instruments, daring orchestrations, tongue-in-cheek curiosity and above all: far from anything that comes close to dogmatism. Everything is possible, nothing is necessary.

Work list

Symphony orchestra: On a landscape by Turner (1992)

Solo with orchestra: Vent d’Est (1995) for accordion and strings

Vocal: Psalmus Tertius (1959, for baritone, choir and orchestra), Ephémères (1979, for mezzo-soprano and 11 instruments, Sieben Galgenlieder (1994, for soprano, clarinet, cello and piano), Pro & Antiverb(e)s (1984, for soprano and cello)

Piano: Capriccio (1954), Ballade (1963)

Two instruments: Filigrane (1969) , for flute and harp), Sonata (1952, for flute and piano), Mosaïques (1965, for clarinet and piano)

Seven instruments: Meandres (2009)

Bibliography

– THOMAS BEIMEL: Halo – Erkundungen zu einem Werk von Jacqueline Fontyn, Köln: Toccata 1991
– ULRIKE THIELE: Untersuchungen zum Instrumentalwerk von Jacqueline Fontyn, Leipzig, 2009
– BETTINA BRAND: “Jacqueline Fontyn, a Portrait”, Neue Berlinische Musikzeitung, Berlin 1988
– BETTINA BRAND: Jacqueline Fontyn, Klangportrait, Berlin: Musikfrauen eV 1991
– THOMAS BEIMEL: “Life is a luminous halo – a Portrait of the Komponistin Jacqueline Fontyn”, Neue Zeitschrift für Musik, Mainz 2000
– KOLJA LESSING: Im conversation with Jacqueline Fontyn Viva Voce, Frankfurt / Main, Winter 2000
– JACQUELINE FONTYN: Nulla Dies Sine Nota. Autobiography, conversations and analyses. German edition: Universal Edition Wien (2013), French edition: Aedam Musicae (2014)

Discography

– EPHEMERES, PER ARCHI, HALO, PSALMUS TERTIUS – Aulos – MusiKado AUL66092
– CRÉNEAUX, BLAKE’S MIRROR, ARATORO, FRISES – voor harmonieorkest, WWM 500 03
– PRO & ANTVERB(E)S, MIME 2, SIX CLIMATS, SIEBEN GALGENLIEDER, LE GONG, MOSAÏQUES, MUSICA A QUATTRO – Cyprès ENKI Productions – CYP 4620
– AURA, DIURNES, CAPRICCIO, LE GONG, HAMADRYADES, MOSAICI, BALLADE, BULLES, SPIRALES – Aulos – MusiKado 66150
– SUL CUOR DELLA TERRA – OTR C10385
– VENT D’EST, IN THE GREEN SHADE, RIVAGES SOLITAIRES, GOEIE HOOP – Aulos – MusiKado 66157
– OEUVRES POUR ORCHESTRE – Cybele SACD 860.601
– QUATRE CONCERTOS : REVERIE ET TURBULENCE, CAPRICORNE, COLINDA, ES IST EIN OZEAN – Cybele 3 SACD KIG 005