Ferdinand Gasse Ferdinand Gasse Ferdinand Gasse (1780 – ca. 1840) was a French violinist and composer. Born in Naples, Gasse, who was probably related to the architect Louis-Silvestre Gasse, born eight years later in Naples, attended the violin class of Pierre Rode at the Conservatoire de Paris from 1798. He also had lessons with Rodolphe Kreutzer, the dedicatee of Beethoven's famous Kreutzer-Sonata. He also studied harmony with Charles-Simon Catel and musical composition with François-Joseph Gossec. From 1801 Gasse was violinist at the Paris Opera. In 1805 he received the deuxième Grand Prix de Rome for his cantata "Cupidon pleurant Psyché" (after a
Violin Sonata (Franck) December of that year, at the Musée Moderne de Peinture (Museum of Modern Painting) in Brussels. Ysaÿe and Bordes-Pène were again the performers. The Sonata was the final item in a long program which started at 3pm. When the time arrived for the Sonata, dusk had fallen and the gallery was bathed in gloom, but the museum authorities permitted no artificial light whatsoever. Initially, it seemed the Sonata would have to be abandoned, but Ysaÿe and Bordes-Pène decided to continue regardless. They had to play the last three movements from memory in virtual darkness. When the violinist Armand Parent remarked