Camille-Marie Stamaty - Biography - 1835-1870: Celebrity Teacher

1835-1870: Celebrity Teacher

For some 35 years (1835–1870) Stamaty must have been the most sought after and the most fashionable piano teacher in Paris. He had numerous students, most of them from wealthy families in the aristocratic Faubourgs (Saint-Germain and Saint-Honoré). He charged some of the highest fees in Paris. According to Marmontel he was a born teacher and also had the useful talent of inspiring trust not so much in his pupils but in their mothers:

Let's add that he (Stamaty) combined all the proper qualities that would inspire confidence and trust in mothers of families: Distinction, reserve, correct and pure talent. He talked little and achieved a lot.

Apart from Louis Moreau Gottschalk, Stamaty's most famous pupil was Camille Saint-Saëns. Saint-Saëns started with Stamaty when he was seven years old (1842) and he stayed with him until he was fourteen (1849), whence he went on to the Paris Conservatoire. Although Saint-Saëns in his later life was very critical, even dismissive of Stamaty's teaching, it is a fact that Saint-Saëns under Stamaty's tutelage developed into a first rate pianist who maintained the high level of his playing all his life, well into his eighties.