
Marguerite Long
Credit: Wikipedia
Born in Nîmes in 1874, Marguerite Long began her studies as a child with her sister as her tutor. Continuing her lessons with Henri Fissot at the Paris Conservatoire, at the age of seventeen Long won the first prize in a competition that launched her successful international solo career.
Fauré Ballade

Gabriel Fauré
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The First World War intervened, tragically affecting many of the composers and artists with whom she worked. Long’s husband, Joseph de Marliave, was killed in action in August 1914. Between 1914 and 1917 Maurice Ravel composed Le Tombeau de Couperin—a six-movement suite in the Baroque style, dedicating each movement to the memory of friends who had died fighting. Ravel dedicated the last section, the Toccata, to Marliave. The first performances of the work took place in 1919, Marguerite Long at the piano.

Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers
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Rumor has it that Ms. Long was “pushy and demanding.” Perhaps this was the perception of a woman performer who had already voiced an interest in having Ravel write a new work for her. Ravel had begun to compose his Concerto in G in 1929 as a vehicle for himself but his own solo career and the composition of another piano work, the Concerto for the Left Hand, intervened. Pianist Paul Wittgenstein, who commissioned the latter work, also had to serve in the army in 1914. During the assault on Russian Poland, Wittgenstein was wounded and taken prisoner. Russian surgeons with scant resources amputated his right arm. After the war, “Determined upon the plan of training myself to become a one-armed pianist, at least to attempt it,” he began to practice seven hours a day and ultimately commissioned several composers to write works for him for left hand alone including Ravel.
Ravel Concerto in G 1952

Marguerite Long and Maurice Ravel
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In April 1932, Long recorded the concerto under the composer’s “ruthless” supervision and since Ravel was displeased with changes that Wittgenstein tried to make in the solo part of the Left-Hand Concerto, she also introduced this piece to Parisian audiences.
Faure Piano Quartet with Thibaud, Vieux and Fournier

Jacques Thibaud
Credit: http://www.biografiasyvidas.com/
In 1943 Long and Thibaud founded the Marguerite Long-Jacques Thibaud International Competition for Violinists and Pianists. The competition takes place every year to this day despite Thibaud’s tragic death in 1953 in an airplane crash. (41 people perished and Thibaud’s 1720 Stradivarius violin was lost as well.)
In 2011, the competition was expanded to include singers and re-named the Long-Thibaud-Crespin Competition in recognition of French soprano, opera star Regine Crespin.
Marguerite Long continued to record and concertize and until her death in 1966, at age 91, Long devoted herself completely to the contest. Notable winners include Paul Badura-Skoda, Jean-Phillipe Collard, Philippe Entremont, Vladimir Spivakov, György Pauk and many others. This year in October the competition is slated for piano.
Fortunately for piano lovers there are several recordings still available so we can hear her exquisite playing. One of my favorites is her performance of the Chopin’s Scherzo.
Long performs Chopin Scherzo