Daniel Charles

Daniel Paul Charles was a French musician, musicologist and philosopher, born on November 27, 1935 in Oran (Algeria) and deceased on August 21, 2008 in Antibes (France).

He was a student of Olivier Messiaen at the Paris Conservatory of Music (First Prize, 1956), he received the aggregation in philosophy in 1959 and a PhD under the direction of Mikel Dufrenne in 1977.

After leading (late 1968) the Commission charged with establishing the status of professorship of music at the French Ministry of Education, he founded and lead for twenty years (1969–1989) the Department of Music of University of Paris VIII (Vincennes, and St. Denis). He was also responsible, from 1970 to 1980, for the teaching of general aesthetics at the University of Paris IV (Sorbonne). He decided to end his career by teaching philosophy at the University of Nice Sophia-Antipolis (1989–1999).

When he graduated from the Paris Conservatory of Music in 1956, he participated in the GRM under the leadership of Pierre Schaeffer, and proposed to set into electronic music Stéphane Mallarmé's "Coup de dés" in Darmstadt, a project which caught the attention of . But his lack of enthusiasm toward the "solfège des bruits" of Schaeffer led him to focus instead on John Cage, whom he met in 1958. He contributed then to present Cage's music and philosophy in France: Pour les oiseaux (co-signed with Cage), published first in French (Paris, Belfond, 1976) became a classic book. It was later published in English: For the Birds.

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