André Navarra

André-Nicolas Navarra (13 October 1911 – 31 July 1988) was a French cellist and cello teacher who was born in Biarritz and died in Siena.

[2] His parents took steps to prepare him for music before setting him up with an instrument, teaching him scales and solfège before he began studying cello at age seven.

He then continued his studies at the Conservatoire de Paris, learning cello from Jules-Leopold Loeb and chamber music from Charles Tournemire.

[3] Navarra remained in Paris for this period of self-study, and used the opportunity to meet and observe the playing of musicians such as Emanuel Feuermann, the pianist Alfred Cortot, and the violinist Jacques Thibaud.

[2] Two years later, he made his solo debut with Paris's Colonne Orchestra, performing Édouard Lalo's Cello Concerto in D minor.

[3] Navarra slowly continued to establish his career throughout the 1930s, receiving a major boost in 1937 when he won first prize at the Vienna International Competition.

In 1949, he accepted a professorship at the Conservatoire de Paris as a successor to Pierre Fournier, and meanwhile toured extensively in the United States, Europe, Asia, and the Soviet Union, playing with the era's great conductors.