Henri Marius Christiné (27 December 1867 – 25 November 1941) was a French composer of Swiss birth.[1]
The son of a French
Savoyard watchmaker,[2] Christiné was born in
Geneva, Switzerland. He began by teaching at the
lycée in Geneva, while pursuing his interest in music and playing organ in a local church. He married a cafe singer whose troupe was passing through Geneva, and went with her to
Nice where they were married.[3] He made his home in
France, writing songs firstly for his wife and then for popular singers such as
Mayol,
Dranem, and
Fragson. He also conducted for the
music hall at the Place Clichy.
Although Christiné wrote some
operettas for the Scala theatre in
Paris before the
First World War, his career took off when he had his operetta Phi-Phi staged the day of the
Armistice on 11 November 1918, with words by
Albert Willemetz and Fabien Solar and which ran for three years at the
Bouffes-Parisiens. This success was followed by Dédé in 1921, Madame (1923) and J'adore ça (1925). These works were in the forefront of a new fashion in music-theatre: sparkling, witty, jazzy musical plays.[4] Christiné's tunes often build on repeated refrains of six or seven notes (a 'hook') which made them catchy and popular for contemporary audiences.[5]
In the 1930s Christiné contributed to the renewed fashion for more large-scale spectacular musicals, with pieces for the
Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris, Au temps des Merveilleuses and Yana; for these he wrote the more vibrant numbers, while Richepin did the romantic songs.[6] "Le Bonheur, Mesdames" and "Le Flirt ambulant" were rearrangements of his songs from the 1900s.[7] He died in Nice, France.
Phi-Phi and Dédé are still occasionally revived in France.