Today is the birthday of the French composer Georges Auric, who was born on February 15, 1899. Auric was one of a group of avant-garde composers in Paris known as “Les Six,” or “The Six,” a group that also included Darius Milhaud and Francis Poulenc. The image of the romantic artist, tragic and solitary, had absolutely no appeal for Auric, and he wrote a number of works in collaboration with the other members of Les Six.
In the 1930's Auric began composing music for films, and he eventually wrote the music for twenty-seven films in all. One song, “Where is Your Heart,” from the 1952 film Moulin Rouge, is still probably Auric’s best-known work. When he was in his sixties, Auric became the director of the Paris National Opera and the chairman of SACEM, the French version of ASCAP, and before his death in 1983 he spent much of his time encouraging the work of young composers.
This has been A Minute with Miles – a production of South Carolina Public Radio, made possible by the J.M. Smith Corporation.
