Edoardo Farner

Edoardo Farner (also Edouard Farner) was born 1899 in Genoa (Italy). He studied dentistry at the University of Geneva (Switzerland) and earned a doctor's degree in this profession in 1927. He was founding member of the "Association des Medecins Dentistes de Geneve". Since 1925 he was a member of the society "Pro Ticino", an association that supports and promotes the language, culture, and traditions of Ticino. And since the early 1930s Edoardo Farner was the choir master of the "Pro Ticino" choir. Therefore he very likely took music lessons privately beside his medical studies or studied music parallelly at the conservatory.

Since the 1940s Edoardo Farner also composed music. He created a pseudonym for his compositions from the first letters of his given and family name and signed his works as "Faredo". He mainly composed songs and chansons, a few piano and instrumental works. Some of these works were published by a Genevan publisher called "Edition Vogert". And his composition "Peppina bella!" was recorded by the Orchestra Allegro with tenor Libero de Luca and released on a shellac record. At that time Edoardo Farner was also president of the association "Pro Ticino" in Geneva.

The manuscripts show no composition that was composed after 1950, so Edoardo Farner must have stopped composing at that time for unknown reason.

Edoardo Farner died on 18 February 1979 in Geneva (Switzerland).

Edoardo Farner Archive

In my possession is a large part of the musical estate of Edoardo Farner. The following finding aid provides information about the documents in my archive.

Due to the fact that there is so little known about Edoardo Farner and especially about his compositions I present here a few of his works for information purposes:

Liberi e svizzeri - Mazurka for piano op.2 (1940)

Passa la bicicletta - Canzone-valzer popolare di attualita, for voice and piano op. 5 (1941)

Primole rosse - Mazurka for piano

Other composers

In addition to his own compositions the estate of Edoardo Farner contained the following scores by other composers:

• Ernst Levy (1895-1891): Fifth symphony for violin, piano and orchestra (1925). Autograph piano reduction by Gertrud Kelterborn.
• A. Merault (?-?): C'est un bapteme, for piano (1943). Autograph manuscript. Dedicated to Edoardo Farner.
• A. Merault (?-?): Fa Re Do, for piano. Autograph manuscript
• G. Melilli (?-?): Inno Goliardico, for voices and piano. Text by Gizzi-Rava. Handwritten score most likely by a copyist.
• Ernest Viollier (?-?): Valseuse – Fantaisie pour chant et piano (1880). Text by Jules Cougnard. Handwritten score most likely by a copyist.
• Jean Ruata (?-?): Sei bella Patria mia, for voices and guitar. Private copy of the score.
• Unknown composer: Canzone dei Vendemmiatori, for SATB chorus (I own the four parts for soprano, alto, tenor and bass and none of them bears a composer name. The handwriting is slightly different to the other manuscripts by Edoardo Farner, so it is uncertain if the composition is by him)