The composing career (作曲生涯) of Albert Roussel got off to a changeable start, and received one of its biggest successes from a lie.
Roussel became an orphan (孤儿) at the age of eight and went to live with his grandfather. He built on the music he had learned from his mother, entertaining himself by reading through the family music collection and playing operatic selections and popular songs on the piano. Three years later Roussel’s grandfather died, and his mother's sister took him in. Her husband arranged for young Albert to take piano lessons. Summer vacations at a Belgian seaside added a second love to his life — the sea. He studied to be a soldier in the navy, but still made time to study music.
In the French Navy, he and two friends found time to play the music of Beethoven and other composers. Roussel also began composing. At the Church of the Trinity in Cherbourg on Christmas Day 1892, he had his first public appearance as a composer. That success encouraged Roussel to write a wedding march, and one of his fellow naval officers offered to show it to a famous conductor, Edouard Colonne. When Roussel’s friend returned with the manuscript (手稿), he reported that Colonne had advised Roussel to give up his naval career and devote his life to music.
Not long afterward, at the age of 2S, Roussel did just that. He applied the qualities that he had developed in the navy to his composing and became a major force in twentieth century French music. As for Edouard Colonne’s inspiring advice that Roussel should devote his life to music, Roussel's naval friend later admitted that he had made it up and that he had never even shown Roussel’s manuscript to the conductor.