ABSTRACT
Saint-Saëns was called by his most famous student, Gabriel Fauré, the most complete French musician of his time. 2 As composer, pianist, and organist, his virtues have been acclaimed by other leading musicians from Berlioz 3 to Ravel, 4 including Liszt, 5 Wagner, 6 and von Bülow. 7 However it is as a pedagogue and public educator that his role has been neglected and, aside from his relationship with Fauré, 8 unexplored and unacknowledged. Despite the fact that Saint-Saëns held only one longterm teaching position, a study of his life reveals that he was surely one of the outstanding pedagogues of his time, though often in unconventional ways.
