Marcel Cariven

Marcel Auguste Antoine Cariven (18 April 1894 – 5 November 1979), was a French conductor, particularly associated with light music and with operetta.

Life and career Cariven undertook musical studies firstly at the conservatoire in Toulouse, then in Paris, where he was a pupil of Xavier Leroux, Paul Vidal, and André Gedalge where he won first prizes in harmony, music history and composition. During the war years he conducted a revival of Les cent vierges by Lecocq in September 1942 at the Apollo theatre in Paris.

Cariven made his debut at the Paris Opéra-Comique in December 1947 with Manon. From the 1950s to the early 1970s he was active at French Radio, conducting many operetta recordings

Recordings Cariven made several recordings in the 1930s and 40s, and later for French radio:

Hahn - Beaucoup de bruit pour rien 'musique de scène' (1936, Voix de son maître) Schubert songs (Ständchen, Die Forelle and others) with the tenor Georges Thill (1935, Columbia) Pierné - Fragonard - two excerpts (1943, Pathé) Donizetti - Don Pasquale - excerpts, with Vina Bovy and Luis Mariano (1944 Voix de son maître) Adam - Si j'étais roi - Overture, with Orchestre Lamoureux (1947, Pathé) Planquette - Les Cloches de Corneville with Orchestre Lamoureux (1947, Pathé) Waldteufel - various waltzes (1943, 1945, 1947, Pathé) Audran - Le Grand Mogol - excerpts with the Orchestre Lamoureux (1948, Pathé) Offenbach - La Grande-Duchesse de Gérolstein - excerpts with the Orchestre Lamoureux (1948, Pathé) Hahn - Ciboulette with l'Orchestre de la Société des Concerts du Conservatoire (1952, Pathé) Christiné - Phi-Phi - selection (1952, Pathé) Hervé - Mam'zelle Nitouche - selection (1953, Pathé) Varney - Les Mousquetaires au couvent (1953, Pathé) Hervé - Le Retour d'Ulysse and Trombolino, with Jean Giraudeau and Denise Duval (1956, Gaieté Lyrique) Lehár - Le Pays des Sourires (1956, Pathé) Offenbach - La Vie parisienne (1956, Philips) Lehár - Frasquita (1956, Véga) Scotto - Violettes impériales (1961, Véga) Lecocq - Ali Baba (1961, Classical Moments) Offenbach - La Créole (1969, Bourg)