Susan Fries Remembering Marcel Moyse

I first met Marcel Moyse in 1967 when he came to Oberlin Conservatory, Ohio to conduct special master classes for the centennial celebration there.

We connected almost immediately, and I subsequently spent time with Moyse as a student, as a host and as a friend. I often visited his home in Brattleboro, Vermont for lessons and seminars. In January 1981, he stayed at my home in Newport Beach, traveling daily to Los Angeles to give special flute and woodwind classes to qualified musicians. The 15 years I knew him were a long series of wonderful, enlightening adventures.

As a master teacher, Moyse expressed a joyous and adventurous spirit, a love of life and an infectious sense of humor. He was passionate, possessing a deep sensitivity to everything in life from nature, to the physical environment, to people.

Marcel Moyse brought out genius in students, even when they did not know that this quality existed within them. His techniques of teaching were legendary, sometimes theatrical and always charming. In order to convey the character of a piece of music, or even a certain phrase, Moyse often narrated a colorful story from his own life or used analogies from the physical world. (For example, “Reach for the stars,” or “the bouncing ball.”) Woodwind players, who heard the music within his message, learned how to dynamically bring composers’ music to life.

Marcel Moyse was 16-years-old when he auditioned for Paris Conservatory in 1905. The faculty jury included awe-inspiring composers and performers, such as Taffanel, Franck, Saint-Saens, Thomas and Massanet.

He often described his many weeks of intense preparation for this
terrifying event. Every day while he practiced, he imagined walking into the audition room and performing for this illustrious Board, all seated at a long table, wearing frowning faces.

“When the audition day came,” he said, “ I decided not to warm up in the flute room where I knew that all of the flute players in the room would intimidate me with their incredible warm-up routines.”

“Instead, I decided that my first note that day would be for the Board. I went directly to the doorman and told him to call me when it was my time to play. Later, when I entered the audition room, a very unexpected thing happened to me – suddenly, I was no longer nervous!” His powerful imagination conjured up an experience that proved to be far worse than the actual one!

He often admonished his students, “Don’t associate with other flutists!”

“For many years, I dedicated my life as a flutist to playing and sounding exactly like Taffanel—my teacher at Paris Conservatory.

“I put myself totally into my teacher’s hands, but I learned too well and too fast. In fact, I was disappointed to graduate, receiving my First Prize after only one short school year. I was not ready to leave
Taffanel because I wanted to learn MORE.”

Although Moyse was completely immersed in his journey to become like Taffanel, one day, years later, he suddenly realized that he was not another Taffanel, but that he was Moyse, and, “it wasn’t bad!”

“If Taffanel were alive today,” he once declared to a flute class
assembled in his Vermont home, “I would go on my knees all the way to Philadelphia to take lessons from him again.” (June 1975)

I went to West Brattleboro, Vermont, as often as finances and motherhood allowed for private lessons with Mr. Moyse.

One particular visit occurred during a wonderful “January Thaw.” The sky was a beautiful clear blue and the melting snow sparkled in the sunshine. People stopped work, threw off their overcoats (but not their boots) and all the outdoor lunch spots were filled with people enjoying the winter break!

I trudged up the long steep hill to Mr. Moyse’s Vermont chalet (passing a farm horse with long thick fur hanging down about four inches from his body).

The lesson started at 2 pm. I had prepared the Allemande from J.S.
Bach’s Unaccompanied Flute Sonata in A Minor. I also brought Mr. Moyse’s published 50 Variations on the Allemande, which he had composed to facilitate understanding of the Bach work, and to help the player discover natural phrasing and breathing points, in a piece of unrelenting sixteenth notes. Four hours later, I finished playing all 50 variations, including #50, the “jazz” variation.

At the end of the lesson, Le Maitre stood up. His arms shot straight up as he stamped his foot joyfully, with “HAA! You improve leet by leet (little by little). Silver flute, golden tone.”

Twenty minutes later, I arrived at my hotel—as if in a dream—to rest on my bed for a few moments before dinner. I woke up at 10 AM the next day!!

Moyse was gazing out of the big windows of his chalet in the Green
Mountains near West Brattleboro, Vermont, where our flute class was assembled. We could see an early morning silvery blue mist hanging over the mountains. Some pine trees stood out in complete clarity and others receded in the mist.

“Create that blue atmosphere. Create the quality. Create the flavor.
Create the serene mood in this beautiful melody,” he said.

He raised his head and sniffed deeply, as if to smell the forest too. (Moyse was born without the ability to smell anything. “It could be merde or a rose,” he would say, “I would not know the difference.”)

One day, he excitedly told me that a student had just brought him a
large bunch of violets and he thought he smelled them!

“Create atmosphere.” Marcel Moyse

In 1949, concert pianist Rudolph Serkin wrote to Moyse, saying that there was a small college town in Vermont, near Serkin’s country farm home, needing a music faculty. He suggested that the Moyse Trio could become the entire faculty. This trio was well-known as an illustrious European performing group: Moyse could teach flute and chamber music; Louis, his son, could teach composition and piano; and Blanche Honneger Moyse, his daughter-in-law, could teach violin, music courses and conduct choirs.

The Moyse family graciously took his suggestion and once again packed all of their belongings. From Argentina, they sailed to New York where they were met and taken to Marlboro, Vermont. A house had been rented for them. The setting pleased the Moyse family enormously, and they were inspired by the similarity of the Green Mountains in Vermont to the Jura Mountains in France. They also found the climate to be refreshingly similar.

By the summer of 1950, Rudolph Serkin, pianist, Adolph Busch, cellist, and Marcel Moyse were joyfully playing chamber music together. News of their informal playing spread and musicians began to gather. Their numbers grew from a few selected students and musicians to crowds who found housing accommodations in succeeding summers on the Marlboro College campus.

As more prominent musicians joined the original three, the philosophy they held was one of mix and match. For example, mature seasoned professionals (often famous), joined those in mid career, along with musicians entering the profession. They loved the democratic atmosphere they had created, as they freely played together and learned from each other. The atmosphere there became a kind of utopia. Students came in droves to hear their teachers perform informal summer concerts, which officially started in 1951.

Concerts were originally held in the college dining hall and later in a converted barn.

During mealtimes, the dining hall, filled with musicians and their families, often became a melee of napkin ball fights, usually started by Rudolph Serkin.

Over the years, the festival attracted bigger and bigger crowds; performances/recordings changed the focus to big business. Marvelous music continued to be produced. The arrival of cellist Pablo Casals added more fame to the festival. At the same time, Moyse drew too many flutists and woodwind players for Marlboro to accommodate; so he held seminars for winds, pre-season, beginning in 1961. He was also loved as a fantastic conductor of large woodwind works that were performed at festival concerts. Historical recordings are available.