Arthur Honegger (1892-1955): Le Roi David
(King David)
Born in 1892 at Le Havre to parents
originating from Zurich, Arthur Honegger was deeply influenced by this double
identity, his Protestant ancestry and the Catholic country in which he was
born, the sea and the mountains, Honegger's life, dedicated to music, was
relatively uneventful, apart from the difficult war years spent in Paris, after
a short period of military service in Switzerland. It was in 1947 that the
first signs of heart disease overtook him, during a visit to New York. He died
several years later, in 1955, in Paris.
Honegger's musical training began at Le Havre under local teachers and continued in Zurich, where his vocation became clear. At the Paris Conservatoire he was a pupil of Widor for composition and orchestration and of Vincent d'Indy for orchestral conducting, but, more importantly, of André Gédalge for counterpoint. Gédalge, who taught Florent Schmitt, Koechlin, Enesco, Ra