Emma Bardac

Emma Bardac (née Moyse; 10 July 1862 – 20 August 1934) was a French singer and the mutual love interest of both Gabriel Fauré and Claude Debussy.

Emma Bardac
Born	Emma Moyse 10 July 1862
Died	20 August 1934(1934-08-20) (aged 72)
Resting place	Cimetière de Passy, Paris
Occupation	Singer
Spouses	Sigismond Bardac ​ ​ (m. 1878; div. 1905)​ Claude Debussy ​ ​ (m. 1908; died 1918)​
Partner	Gabriel Fauré
Children	Raoul Bardac Hélène, Madame Gaston de Tinan Claude-Emma Debussy

Of Jewish descent, Emma married, aged 17, Parisian banker Sigismond Bardac, by whom she had two children: Raoul, and Régina-Hélène (later Madame Gaston de Tinan (1892–1985)). Emma was an accomplished singer and brilliant conversationalist. Fauré wrote his Dolly Suite in the 1890s for Regina-Hélène and La bonne chanson for Emma.

Bardac's last home, now 23 Square Avenue Foch, Paris[1]

The Debussys' grave at Passy Cemetery

After her affair with Fauré, Emma was introduced to Debussy in late 1903 by her son Raoul, one of his students.[2] In the summer of 1904, after a secret vacation with Emma in Jersey, Debussy wrote to his wife Rosalie ("Lilly") Texier announcing the end of their marriage. Distraught, Texier attempted suicide with a revolver. The ensuing scandal alienated Bardac and Debussy from friends and family, and in the spring of 1905 they fled to England, where they finalized their divorces, Emma from Sigismond on 4 May, Debussy from Rosalie on 2 August. They returned to Paris in time for the birth, on 30 October, of their daughter Claude-Emma, nicknamed "Chouchou", and dedicatee of his Children's Corner Suite composed in 1909.[3] The couple bought a large house in a courtyard development off the Avenue du Bois de Boulogne (now Avenue Foch), where Debussy would reside for the rest of his life.[4] Bardac eventually married Debussy in 1908, their troubled union enduring until Debussy's death 10 years later. Claude-Emma died while recovering from diphtheria in 1919 when the doctor gave her the wrong treatment, the year after her father's death.[5] Emma Bardac died in 1934 and, like Claude-Emma, was laid to rest in Debussy's grave in the Cimetière de Passy in Paris.