Composer
Biography
Almost everything Paul-Agricole Génin wrote was for his own instrument. Born in Avignon, he trained at the Paris Conservatoire with Jean-Louis Tulou and Louis Dorus, took a first prize in 1861, and held principal flute chairs at the Théâtre-Italien and in the Concerts Colonne. His catalogue — more than sixty works are attributed to him — runs to concert fantasies, variations and character pieces, with operatic paraphrases on La traviata and Faust among them. Carnaval de Venise, Op. 14, has outlived the rest, and still catches players out: it asks for clarity of articulation and breath control quite as much as for velocity. He died in 1903.