The Popular Front Years and World War II

During the Popular Front Years (1934–1939), Auric’s politics swung to the left and he joined several arts organizations of the French Communist Party. His populist works from these years include numerous pieces of incidental music and film scores, but also concert music, music for young musicians, campfire songs, and other popular songs. Although his music hardly changed stylistically from the 1920s, he now actively reached out to the broadest audiences possible. During the German Occupation, Auric joined or otherwise contributed to several intellectual networks of the French Resistance. His war-time roles would result in a privileged position after the war, as a leading critic and arts administrator.

Post-War and Post-Apollinaire

After World War I, Auric’s many friendships placed him in a unique position in the Parisian avant-garde. On the one hand, he was alongside Louis Aragon, André Breton, Philippe Soupault, and Tristan Tzara for the rise and fall of Paris dada. On the other, he was a member of Les Six, the group of composers led by Jean Cocteau who came to represent Parisian art music in the 1920s. Throughout the feuds between the dadaists and Cocteau, Auric preserved his friendships and functioned as an ambassador of sorts between rival avant-garde groups. In the meantime, his scores for Cocteau’s Les mariés de la Tour Eiffel (with the rest of Les Six) and Molière’s Les fâcheux would lead to bigger and better opportunities in the mid-1920s.

Personifying the Musical Establishment

As Auric’s film career continued to expand during the late 1950s and 1960s, he also held more arts administration positions. Perhaps the most important was his continuing presidency of SACEM. After the establishment of the Fifth Republic in 1958, Auric heeded Culture Minister André Malraux’s call for cultural action. With other leaders at SACEM, Auric initiated a series of transformations to the society. After expanding the membership and increasing the benefits to members, he led the creation of a cultural action program that now annually awards more than 50 million euros per year in grants. Auric’s most prominent position, however, was as Administrator of the Réunion des Théâtres Lyriques Nationaux. During his six years running the Paris Opéra and Opéra-Comique, he implemented a number of reforms that restored the Opéra’s financial health.

Parisian Debuts and World War I

In 1913, Georges Auric and his family moved to Paris, where he studied for one year at the Conservatoire and one year at the Schola Cantorum. During his first year in the capital, Auric published his first pieces of music criticism, performed a recital for the Société Musicale Indépendante, and had compositions performed on a recital for the Société Nationale de Musique. From these auspicious beginnings, he participated in several avant-garde art groups and was invited to join many of the most prestigious Parisian salons. In 1917, he was drafted into the army; though his military record was undistinguished, it led to close friendships with Louis Aragon and André Breton.

Retirement

In 1968, Auric stepped down from the Réunion des Théâtres Lyriques Nationaux and went into semi-retirement. He would remain active with SACEM and CISAC for the remainder of his life. With SACEM, he was particularly invested in expanding the cultural action programs and in arranging for the construction of a new headquarters building in Neuilly. With both organizations, he remained active in the copyright debates, most notably participating in the 1967 and 1971 revision conferences for the Berne Convention. During his final decade of compositional activity, Auric produced two series of chamber works that further explored the more sober, contemporary style that he had developed in his ballets of the 1950s.

Boeuf sur le Toit and the Ballets Russes

The phenomenon of Les Six and Auric’s role in Paris Dada positioned Auric at the center of the avant-garde between 1921 and 1925. His name even appeared in advertisements for Le Boeuf sur le Toit, the bar at which the Parisian avant-garde met and debated. This privileged position was reinforced by five commissions from Serge Diaghilev for the Ballets Russes. As a pianist, he played in the premiere of Stravinsky’s Les noces. As a music critic, he was also offered his first regular column in Les nouvelles littéraires. As life in Paris grew increasingly demanding for him, he increasingly sought refuge in southern France during the summers.

New Beginnings in the Post-War Years

After World War II, Auric enjoyed a privileged position in the French musical scene, with numerous ballets and scores of incidental music. He was also by this time the leading composer for the French cinema; he remains the only person to have won music prizes at both the Cannes and Venice film festivals. From the 1940s through the 1960s, he composed dozens of films in the French “tradition of quality,” but also for British and American films and for international co-productions. He also was elected to the Administrative Council at SACEM, ultimately serving as President for three decades. In the late 1950s, he was a defendant in Hirshon v. United Artists, a case that clarified two sections of the U.S. Copyright Code, and he was also the principal lobbyist on behalf of the Loi Escarra, the first modern copyright law in France.

Withdrawing from the Parisian Music Scene

After a dispute with Diaghilev over money and after a long-standing feud with fellow music critic Emile Vuillermoz, Auric abruptly made several shifts in his career in the late 1920s. He briefly moved out of Paris into the suburbs. He began collaborating frequently with avant-garde theatre companies and, beginning in 1930, would compose his first three film scores. He also dreamed of composing major works of absolute music, resulting in his 1930–31 Sonate en fa. In 1930, he married the painter Nora Vilter and the two settled in Hyères, in a home given to them by Charles and Marie de la Noailles. As the Great Depression settled into France, the Aurics struggled financially and his career reached its lowest point.

Childhood in Lodève and Montpellier

Georges Auric was born in 1899 in Lodève, France, to a family of hoteliers. Three years later, his family moved to nearby Montpellier, the principal city of the Languedoc region in southern France. The year 1907 would prove to be transformative for the Aurics. During the Viticulture Revolt, the largest demonstration of Third Republic France took place virtually on the Aurics’ doorstep, launching his father’s brief political career. Meanwhile, Auric began studying piano at the Montpellier Conservatoire with Louis Combes, who introduced the young musician to modernist music and literature in addition to facilitating Auric’s acceptance into the Paris Conservatoire in 1913.