[2] Among his pupils were Raynald Arseneault, Nicolas Bacri, Gérard Buquet, Joseph-François Kremer, Philippe Manoury, Serge Provost, Mehmet Okonsar,[citation needed] Simon Bertrand,[3] Alexandre Desplat,[4] and Claude Abromont.

[5] He was described as a French modernist and as "the product of the exciting and turbulent post World War II years of the Western avant-garde" alongside composers Pierre Boulez and Karlheinz Stockhausen.

[11][13] While in Madagascar, "Captain Durand," an artillery director on base, taught Ballif music theory; he took violin lessons from a beggar.

[13][2][11] He left in 1948 to attend the Conservatoire de Paris with Aubin and Messiaen as his teachers and Alain Weber, Michel Fano, and Jean-Michel Defaye as his classmates.

[2][11][13][8] In 1954, he was awarded a German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) grant that allowed him to study at the Hochschule für Musik in Berlin.

[13][1][11] He spent three summers in Germany, particularly at the Darmstädter Ferienkurse, where he met Luciano Berio, Bruno Maderna, Luigi Nono, and Karlheinz Stockhausen.

[2] He subsequently taught in Sevran for ten years before visiting Venezuela with Williams Montesinos and Austin Marianu in July 2000.

[15] Ballif spent the final years of his life living in Haute-Marne at the Château de Riaucourt, which had been passed down to him by his maternal grandfather.

[1] He credits his "deep friendship" with Jean Wahl, Josef Rufer, Andréas Rónaï, and Pierre Schaeffer for solidifying the concept and practice of metatonality very early on.