- A Swiss national who spent most his life in France, Honegger composed music for French and British films. He also wrote five symphonies and a piece entitled "Pacific 231" (his most popular composition), a musical depiction of a heavy locomotive in motion.
- In the 1920s Honegger was a member of "Les Six", a group of young composers who rebelled against Romanticism and Impressionism in French music. They were mentored by Erik Satie and promoted by Jean Cocteau.
- In 1947, at the start of a planned US tour, Honegger suffered a near-fatal heart attack in Boston. He never fully recovered, and after 1953 was too ill to compose.
- Honegger needed solitude to write music. For most of his marriage to Andrée Vaurabourg (29 years) they lived in separate apartments in Paris.
- Born in France to Swiss parents, Honegger was offered a choice between French and Swiss citizenship when he turned 18 in 1910. He opted for Swiss. As a result he did his compulsory military service (1914-1915) with the neutral Swiss Army and was spared from the battlefields of World War I France.
- Honegger's funeral and cremation were held at Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris. His widow kept his ashes until her death in 1980, after which they were buried together at St. Vincent's Cemetery, Montmartre.
- From 1995 to 2021 Honegger's portrait appeared on the Swiss 20 franc banknote.
- In 1928 Honegger visited the Soviet Union, where his orchestral piece "Pacific 231" (depicting a train in motion) was very popular. He met the young Dmitri Shostakovich in Leningrad and they posed for a photo together. Shostakovich remained a fan. Some 20 years later he created an arrangement for two pianos of Honegger's Symphony No. 3, the "Liturgique".
- In September 1934 Honegger and his wife Andrée were involved in an auto accident in Spain. The composer sustained a broken ankle, but Andrée broke both knees and was unable to walk for a year.
- In 1952 Honegger was elected as a foreign member to the Académie des Beaux-Arts, and in 1954 was named a Grand Officer of the Legion of Honor.
- Opera singer Claire Croiza gave birth to Honegger's son, Jean-Claude, in April 1926. Later that year the composer married his longtime partner, pianist Andrée Vaurabourg. They had one daughter, Pascale, born in 1932.
- Honegger was the first and (at age 63) youngest member of "Les Six" to die. He was followed by Francis Poulenc (64) in 1963, Darius Milhaud (81) in 1974, Louis Durey (91) in 1979, Georges Auric (84) and Germaine Tailleferre (91) in 1983.
- The ice hockey player Doug Honegger is his grandnephew.
- Honegger was pictured on the Swiss twenty franc banknote (eighth series), issued October 1996 and replaced in 2017.
- In 1953 he wrote his last composition, A Christmas Cantata.
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