Ernest Viollier

Ernest-Pierre Viollier was born in 1839 in Naples, Italy, into a Genevan family. He was a son of Auguste Viollier and Rosine Gertrude Rosa d'Allessandro. His father had settled in Naples in 1810 and became director-general of the Steam Navigation Company of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies in 1835. Ernest's mother died in 1843, when he was still a child. It is not yet known when he settled in Geneva or where he received his musical training.
By the 1880s Viollier was active as a composer in Geneva. Official reports of the municipal administration explicitly describe him as a "compositeur". He was also a regular donor of music to Geneva's collections: between 1882 and 1889 alone he presented at least eighteen pieces of music to the municipal library. He is furthermore remembered among the early benefactors of the library of the Geneva Conservatory.
Viollier's compositions were also performed publicly. During the period in which Otto Barblan directed the music at the Cathedral of Saint-Pierre in Geneva, works by Viollier appeared twice on the concert programmes. He was one of only a small number of contemporary Swiss composers represented in these concerts.
Only a few of his compositions have so far been identified by title. They include "Eleda", a short waltz for piano dedicated to Mademoiselle Adèle Chauvets, and "Valseuse – Fantaisie pour chant et piano", composed in 1880 to a text by the Genevan poet Jules Cougnard. Cougnard's first collection of poetry was published in Geneva in the same year.
Ernest Viollier died in 1903 in Geneva.

In my possession is the autograph manuscript of the song "Valseuse - Fantaise pour chant" by Ernest Viollier. The work was composed in 1880 on words by Jules Cougnard.