Georges Gillet Victor Vital , born in Louviers on 17 May 1854 and died in Bessoncourt on 8 February 1920 , is an oboe virtuoso French , which formed in his class oboe Paris Conservatoire oboe most of the first half of the xx th century .
He began his musical studies in Paris , where his family moved. In 1866, attracted by the wind instruments, he chose to study oboe at the Conservatoire de Paris, but can not access the class oboe in 1868 and is headed by. Colin Charles ; between 1863 and 1868, three other big names oboes were followed: Stanislas Verroust , Charles-Louis Triebert and Félix Charles Berthélémy .
In June 1868, Georges Gillet gets first runner with the set piece first solo competitions Colin Charles, and the medal of excellence in music theory. On July 28 of the following year, he obtained 15 first prize for oboe.
After leaving the Academy, he began his career oboe orchestra in 1872 at the Théâtre-Italien for a period of two years, then joined the Concerts Colonne where he remained until 1876. He then joined the Society of concerts Conservatory , which he left in 1899. It is also part of the orchestra of the National Theatre of Opera-Comique from 1878 to 1895 before becoming principal oboist of the orchestra of the Opéra de Paris .
In 1879, following the creation of the League of chamber music for wind instruments, he worked hard with the flutist Paul Taffanel for over 15 years. He participated in all the concerts of the Company as principal oboe, except in 1887, when it is in Russia with Taffanel, Charles Turban and Camille Saint-Saëns .
In 1881, Georges Gillet takes over his master Charles Colin Conservatory. It is at the time the youngest professor of oboe of this great institution. He uses in his teaching studies Barret, Ferling, Luft and Brod . He published his famous 25 studies and makes an important contribution to the pedagogical literature of the oboe. Created that same year, the Lorée house is named official supplier of the Conservatoire oboe.
Studies Gillet pushed the technical limits of the oboe, including the most difficult combinations of notes of serious, the most complicated of acute passages, sentences while developing octaves or harmonics, pages devoted to trills, the chromatic or staccato. They still remain a challenge for all oboists. For fingering tablature that Gillet created to accompany his studies is one of the most reliable for playing oboe oboist 'Conservatoire system' reference sources.
Paradoxically, after substantial work on the teaching of the instrument, offering innovative virtuoso pieces as competition almost entirely written by non oboe composers works. It was also the dedicatee of most of these pieces, as well as numerous pieces for oboe made by Adrien Barthe , Benjamin Godard and Blas Maria Colomer .
George Gillet has also made a significant improvement to the oboe replacing the ring system by a system tray, allowing a simplified technique. He shared this with the performance factor Lorée instruments, which continued the experiment until the final model in 1906.