Lebanese-French organist, composer and improviser (b. 1955)
Naji Subhy Paul Irénée Hakim (Arabic: "ناجي صبحي حكيم" ["Naji Sobhi Hakim"]; born 31 October 1955) is a Franco-Lebanese organist, composer, and improviser.
He studied the organ under Jean Langlais at the Conservatoire de Paris, and succeeded Olivier Messiaen as titular organist at the Église de la Sainte-Trinité, Paris, holding this position from 1993 to 2008. Before this, he was titular organist at the Sacré-Cœur basilica in the same city from 1985 to 1993, succeeding Daniel Roth.
Hakim's numerous improvisations and compositions for organ, orchestra, and other instruments have received renown. His works have been published by Schott Music, UMP, Combre, Éditions Alphonse Leduc, ABRSM, Fitzsimons, Éditions Gérard Billaudot, and American Carillon.
Biography.
Youth: 1955–1972.
Naji Subhy Paul Irénée Hakim was born into a Catholic family on 31 October 1955 in Beirut, Lebanon; to a businessman father, Subhy (died 2022), and his wife Katy Hakim. His Christian name is Paul.
His family were music-loving: his father played the mandolin and sang; his mother is an amateur pianist, and he and his three siblings also studied a variety of instruments of different types. Before the organ, Hakim studied the cello.
When he was five, he heard a pipe organ in his school, the "Collège du Sacré-Coeur" of Beirut. The instrument was built by Debierre-Gloton. Impressed by its sound, Hakim asked his mother two years later to get him a piano, to which she obliged. From then on, Hakim received his first piano lessons from his mother, who self-taught.
His brother, Amine, noticed the then-9 year old Hakim's enthusiasm for the organ and helped him break into the organ loft at the college. Naji was able to pull out all of the organ's stops before playing a single note. Frightened by the sound, the two brothers ran away. The school director took notice of the incident and ordered for the loft to be re-secured.
Hakim, who received permission to practise for half an hour every week (and later received unlimited access to the organ loft, chapel, and campus of the school for practising, under the consent of a new director), then taught himself the organ by using the method books of Jacques-Nicolas Lemmens, Harold Gleason and Marcel Dupré. He would later give his first recital in this chapel aged 15. A year later, he would later master the third of Dupré's "Trois préludes et fugues", op. 7, and César Franck's First "Chorale" in E major.
Studies: 1972–1980.
Many had noticed the young man's prodigiousness in the organ and talent for music, however, due to the prompting of his father, Hakim, aged 16, entered the "Ecole Supérieure d'Ingénieurs de Beyrouth" in 1972. He was advised that a musical career in Lebanon would have not been suitable by the present circumstances. The outbreak of the Lebanese Civil War in 1975, which caused the closure of his engineering school, forced him to flee to Paris in autumn of that year, where he completed his studies at Télécom in 1977.
He also took up a position as substitute organist at Sainte-Odile in Paris and prepared to enter the Conservatoire de Paris, failing the entrance examinations in 1976. Hakim then met Jean Langlais (1907–1991), organist of Sainte-Clotilde and an esteemed composer and organist, and began private lessons in organ playing and improvisation with him in a relationship that lasted about ten years. With his newfound friendship and encouragement, he was able to enter the conservatoire the following year; where he obtained seven first prizes in organ performance, organ improvisation, harmony, counterpoint, fugue, analysis, and orchestration.
Hakim was in the classes of Rolande Falcinelli (organ and improvisation), Roger Boutry (harmony), Jean-Claude Henry (counterpoint), Marcel Bitsch (fugue), Jacques Castérède (analysis) and Serge Nigg (orchestration); as well as that of Langlais himself (organ).
Professional career: 1980–2019.
He was appointed as titular organist of the Basilique du Sacré-Cœur, Paris in 1985, succeeding Daniel Roth. He left in 1993 when he succeeded Olivier Messiaen after the latter's death at the Église de la Sainte-Trinité, Paris, from 1993 until 2008. He serves as Professor of Musical Analysis at the Conservatoire National de Région de Boulogne-Billancourt, and visiting professor of organ, improvisation, analysis, and composition at the Royal Academy of Music, London.
Hakim's compositional output includes instrumental music, symphonic music, and choral music. His works for the organ includes more than three dozen solo pieces, a number of works for organ and other instruments, and four organ concertos with orchestra.
Present day: 2019–.
Despite retiring from the academic scene, Hakim remains an active professional concert organist today.
Awards.
Hakim has won many awards for performance, improvisation, and composition. For example, his "Symphonie en trois mouvements" won the composition prize of the "Amis de l'Orgue" in 1984. "The Embrace of Fire" won first prize in 1986 in the International Organ Competition in memory of Anton Heiller, at Southern Missionary College in Collegedale, Tennessee. In addition, he was awarded the Prix de Composition Musicale André Caplet from the Académie des Beaux Arts in 1991. He has also been the recipient of prizes at the International Organ Competitions held in Beauvaiss (1981), Haarlem (1982), Lyon, Nuremberg, St. Albans (1983) (where he has since served on the jury), Chartres (1984), Strasbourg, and Rennes.
Personal life.
He currently lives in Bayonne with his wife Marie-Bernadette Dufourcet (who he married in 1980), annually visits his homeland of Lebanon, and composes regularly.
They have two children, Jean-Paul, who has followed in his footsteps as a composer, and Katia-Sofia, a musicologist and poet.
Hakim is a polyglot and speaks six languages: French, Arabic, English, Basque, Spanish, and German.
Music.
Hakim began composing in 1983.
References.
 ;templatestyles src="Reflist/styles.css" / ;