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Jacques Ibert
August 15, 1890 - February 5, 1962
born in Paris, France, composed during the Modern period
Biography
Though Jacques Ibert is best remembered for a handful of orchestral bonbons in the manner and spirit of Ravel, his output encompasses nearly every genre and bears testament to a musical language characterized as much by unmistakable craftsmanship as by picturesque color. Ibert trained at the Paris Conservatory under Paul Vidal; as a student, he showed great promise and took a number of the Conservatory's awards. Following military service in World War I, Ibert travelled to Italy as a recipient of the Prix de Rome; there, he composed what was to become one of his most popular works, the orchestral suite Escales (1922). This "travelogue in tones," which depicts touristy locales in Italy, Tunisia, and Spain, has come to be regarded as representative of the "Ibert sound": breezy, good-humored, and evocative. Still, Ibert was far from a "one-note" composer of chronically pleasant music. Another of his works written in Rome, La ballade de la geôle de Reading (The Ballad of Reading Gaol, 1920), is a tone poem based on Oscar Wilde's far-from-cheery reflection upon life in prison; it was the work, in fact, that first brought the composer to widespread attention.