Ginette Martenot was a French

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

 pianist

Pianist

A pianist is a musician who plays the piano. A professional pianist can perform solo pieces, play with an ensemble or orchestra, or accompany one or more singers, solo instrumentalists, or other performers.-Choice of genres:...

 and expert and leading performer on the twentieth-century electronic instrument

Electronic musical instrument

An electronic musical instrument is a musical instrument that produces its sounds using electronics. Such an instrument sounds by outputting an electrical audio signal that ultimately drives a loudspeaker....

 the ondes Martenot

Ondes Martenot

The ondes Martenot , also known as the ondium Martenot, Martenot and ondes musicales, is an early electronic musical instrument invented in 1928 by Maurice Martenot. The original design was similar in sound to the theremin...

, which was invented by her brother Maurice

Maurice Martenot

Maurice Martenot was a French cellist, a radio telegrapher during the first World War, and an inventor.Born in Paris, he is best known for his invention of the ondes Martenot, an instrument he first realized in 1928 and spent decades improving. He unveiled a microtonal model in 1938...

. At the age of sixteen, she entered the Paris Conservatory, where she studied counterpoint

Counterpoint

In music, counterpoint is the relationship between two or more voices that are independent in contour and rhythm and are harmonically interdependent . It has been most commonly identified in classical music, developing strongly during the Renaissance and in much of the common practice period,...

 and fugue

Fugue

In music, a fugue is a compositional technique in two or more voices, built on a subject that is introduced at the beginning in imitation and recurs frequently in the course of the composition....

 with the composer Arthur Honegger

Arthur Honegger

Arthur Honegger was a Swiss composer, who was born in France and lived a large part of his life in Paris. He was a member of Les six. His most frequently performed work is probably the orchestral work Pacific 231, which is interpreted as imitating the sound of a steam locomotive.-Biography:Born...

. She gave the first performance (and subsequently made recordings) as solo ondist in Messiaen's

Olivier Messiaen

Olivier Messiaen was a French composer, organist and ornithologist, one of the major composers of the 20th century. His music is rhythmically complex ; harmonically and melodically it is based on modes of limited transposition, which he abstracted from his early compositions and improvisations...

 Turangalîla-Symphonie

Turangalîla-Symphonie

The Turangalîla-Symphonie is a large-scale piece of orchestral music by Olivier Messiaen. It was written from 1946 to 1948, on a commission by Serge Koussevitzky for the Boston Symphony Orchestra. The premiere was given by that orchestra on December 2, 1949, conducted by Leonard Bernstein in Boston...

, with Yvonne Loriod

Yvonne Loriod

Yvonne Loriod was a French pianist, teacher, and composer, and the second wife of composer Olivier Messiaen. Her sister was the Ondes Martenot player Jeanne Loriod.-Life:...

 taking the solo piano part.

Martenot taught the composer Serge Nigg

Serge Nigg

-Biography:After initial studies with Ginette Martenot, Nigg entered the Paris Conservatory in 1941 and studied harmony with Olivier Messiaen and counterpoint with Simone Plé-Caussade. In 1945, he met René Leibowitz, who introduced him to the twelve-tone technique of composition...

.

External links

• Ginette Martenot (in French)