Jean-François Le Sueur (15 February 1760 – 6 October 1837) was a French composer

Composer

A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...

, best known for his oratorio

Oratorio

An oratorio is a large musical composition including an orchestra, a choir, and soloists. Like an opera, an oratorio includes the use of a choir, soloists, an ensemble, various distinguishable characters, and arias...

s and opera

Opera

Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...

s.

Life

He was born at Plessiel, a hamlet of Drucat

Drucat

Drucat is a commune in the Somme department in Picardie in northern France.-Geography:Drucat is situated on the D82e road, some northeast of Abbeville.-Population:-History:...

 near Abbeville

Abbeville

Abbeville is a commune in the Somme department in Picardie in northern France.-Location:Abbeville is located on the Somme River, from its modern mouth in the English Channel, and northwest of Amiens...

, to a long-established family of Picardy

Picardy

This article is about the historical French province. For other uses, see Picardy .Picardy is a historical province of France, in the north of France...

, the great-nephew of the painter Eustache Le Sueur

Eustache Le Sueur

Eustache Le Sueur or Lesueur , one of the founders of the French Academy of Painting, was born in Paris, where he passed his whole life....

. Beginning as a chorister at the collegial church of Abbeville, then at the cathedral of Amiens

Amiens

Amiens is a city and commune in northern France, north of Paris and south-west of Lille. It is the capital of the Somme department in Picardy...

, where he pursued his music studies, Le Sueur was named chorus master at the cathedral of Sées

Sées

Sées is a commune in the Orne department in north-western France.It lies on the Orne River from its source and north-by-northeast of Alençon.-Name:...

. He went to Paris to study harmony with the Abbé Nicolas Roze, chorus master at the Saints-Innocents. Le Sueur was named to positions at Dijon

Dijon

Dijon is a city in eastern France, the capital of the Côte-d'Or département and of the Burgundy region.Dijon is the historical capital of the region of Burgundy. Population : 151,576 within the city limits; 250,516 for the greater Dijon area....

 (1779), Le Mans

Le Mans

Le Mans is a city in France, located on the Sarthe River. Traditionally the capital of the province of Maine, it is now the capital of the Sarthe department and the seat of the Roman Catholic diocese of Le Mans. Le Mans is a part of the Pays de la Loire region.Its inhabitants are called Manceaux...

 (1782), then at Tours

Tours

Tours is a city in central France, the capital of the Indre-et-Loire department.It is located on the lower reaches of the river Loire, between Orléans and the Atlantic coast. Touraine, the region around Tours, is known for its wines, the alleged perfection of its local spoken French, and for the...

 (1783) before he succeeded Roze at the Saints-Innocents at Paris. Finally in 1786, after a competition, he was made music director at Notre-Dame de Paris.

For the Feast of the Assumption, he innovated by introducing an orchestra, with great success, and his sacred concerts at the main feasts of the Church filled the cathedral to overflowing but incurred resistance in ecclesiastical circles. He replied by publishing a pamphlet Exposé d'une musique imitative et particulière à chaque solennité (1787). The cathedral chapter decided to reduce its musical budget in a time of financial crisis for France, which constrained Le Sueur to give up the important musical Masses that he specialised in, and to give up his position.

He spent some time in London, 1788-92, then returned to revolutionary Paris and gave three successful operas at the Théâtre Feydeau

Théâtre Feydeau

The Théâtre Feydeau, , a former Parisian theatre company, was founded in 1789 with the patronage of Monsieur, Comte de Provence , and was therefore initially named the Théâtre de Monsieur...

: La Caverne, ou le Repentir

La caverne

La caverne, ou Le repentir is an opera in three acts by the French composer Jean-François Le Sueur. It was first performed at the Théâtre Feydeau, Paris on 16 February 1793. The libretto, by Alphonse François "Paul" Palat-Dercy, is based on an episode from Lesage's novel Gil Blas...

 (1793), Paul et Virginie, ou le Triomphe de la vertu (1794), which was inspired by the hugely popular novel by Jacques-Henri Bernardin de Saint-Pierre

Paul et Virginie

Paul et Virginie is a novel by Jacques-Henri Bernardin de Saint-Pierre, first published in 1787. The novel's title characters are very good friends since birth who fall in love...

, and the classical Télémaque dans l'île de Calypso, ou le Triomphe de la sagesse' (1796).

He was named professor at the Ecole de la Garde Nationale, 21 November 1793, then named Inspecteur at the newly-founded Conservatoire. In the company of Étienne Nicolas Méhul, Honoré Langlé, François-Joseph Gossec and Charles Simon Catel

Charles Simon Catel

Charles Simon Catel was a French composer and educator born at L'Aigle, Orne.-Biography:Catel studied at the Royal School of Singing in Paris. He was the chief assistant to François-Joseph Gossec at the orchestra of the National Guard in 1790...

, he was limited to teaching elementary principles and solfège

Solfege

In music, solfège is a pedagogical solmization technique for the teaching of sight-singing in which each note of the score is sung to a special syllable, called a solfège syllable...

. Unable to get his operas Ossian, ou Les bardes

Ossian, ou Les bardes

Ossian, ou Les bardes is an opera in five acts by the French composer Jean-François Le Sueur. The libretto, by Alphonse François "Paul" Palat-Dercy and Jean-Marie Deschamps, is based on the Ossian poems of James Macpherson , which had been translated into French by Pierre-Prime-Félicien Le...

 and La mort d'Adam

La mort d'Adam

La mort d'Adam et son apothéose is a Biblical opera in 3 acts by composer Jean-François Le Sueur with a French libretto by Nicolas-François Guillard. Le Sueur wrote the opera while working as an instructor at the Conservatoire de Musique in Paris. The opera was initially scheduled to be performed...

 mounted at the Paris Opéra

Académie Royale de Musique

The Salle Le Peletier was the home of the Paris Opera from 1821 until the building was destroyed by fire in 1873. The theatre was designed and constructed by the architect François Debret on the site of the former Hôtel de Choiseul...

 Le Sueur published a violent pamphlet, Projet d'un plan général de l'instruction musicale en France, attacking the Conservatoire, its methods and its director, and was discharged, 23 September 1802.

Without official appointments, Le Sueur was reduced to poverty when in 1804, Napoleon named him maître de la chapelle at the Tuileries, to replace Giovanni Paisiello

Giovanni Paisiello

Giovanni Paisiello was an Italian composer of the Classical era.-Life:Paisiello was born at Taranto and educated by the Jesuits there. He became known for his beautiful singing voice and in 1754 was sent to the Conservatorio di S. Onofrio at Naples, where he studied under Francesco Durante, and...

. Now he was able to mount his most famous work, Ossian ou Les bardes, with great success at the Opéra and with the Emperor, who accorded the composer of his favorite opera the cross of the Légion d'honneur

Légion d'honneur

The Legion of Honour, or in full the National Order of the Legion of Honour is a French order established by Napoleon Bonaparte, First Consul of the Consulat which succeeded to the First Republic, on 19 May 1802...

. Le Sueur composed the Triumphal March for the coronation of Napoleon, directed a Mass by Paisiello and a Vivat by his former master abbé Roze. In 1813, he was named to the Académie des Beaux-Arts

Académie des beaux-arts

The Académie des Beaux-Arts is a French learned society. It is one of the five academies of the Institut de France.It was created in 1795 as the merger of the:* Académie de peinture et de sculpture...

, replacing André Grétry.

At the Restoration

Bourbon Restoration

The Bourbon Restoration is the name given to the period following the successive events of the French Revolution , the end of the First Republic , and then the forcible end of the First French Empire under Napoleon  – when a coalition of European powers restored by arms the monarchy to the...

, he was named composer of the royal chapel and conductor of the orchestra of the Opéra. From the beginning of 1818, he taught composition at the Conservatoire, where over the years he had for pupils Hector Berlioz

Hector Berlioz

Hector Berlioz was a French Romantic composer, best known for his compositions Symphonie fantastique and Grande messe des morts . Berlioz made significant contributions to the modern orchestra with his Treatise on Instrumentation. He specified huge orchestral forces for some of his works; as a...

, Ambroise Thomas

Ambroise Thomas

Charles Louis Ambroise Thomas was a French composer, best known for his operas Mignon and Hamlet and as Director of the Conservatoire de Paris from 1871 till his death.-Biography:"There is good music, there is bad music, and then there is Ambroise Thomas."- Emmanuel Chabrier-Early life...

, Charles Gounod

Charles Gounod

Charles-François Gounod was a French composer, known for his Ave Maria as well as his operas Faust and Roméo et Juliette.-Biography:...

, Louis-Désiré Besozzi and Antoine François Marmontel

Antoine François Marmontel

Antoine François Marmontel was a French pianist, teacher and musicographer.Marmontel entered the Paris Conservatory in 1827. His teachers were Pierre Zimmerman in pianoforte, Victor Dourlen in harmony, Jacques Fromental Halévy in fugue and Jean-François Le Sueur in composition...

.

He died in Paris.

Oratorios

• Ruth et Noëmi (written by 1811)
• Ruth et Booz (written by 1811)
• Debbora
• Rachel
• Oratorio de Noël (Christmas Oratorio)
• Three Passion
  Passion (Christianity)
  The Passion is the Christian theological term used for the events and suffering – physical, spiritual, and mental – of Jesus in the hours before and including his trial and execution by crucifixion...
  
   oratorios
• Coronation oratorios

Operas

Completion	Title	Length	Première	Libretto
1793	La caverne La caverne La caverne, ou Le repentir is an opera in three acts by the French composer Jean-François Le Sueur. It was first performed at the Théâtre Feydeau, Paris on 16 February 1793. The libretto, by Alphonse François "Paul" Palat-Dercy, is based on an episode from Lesage's novel Gil Blas...	3 acts	16 February 1793, Paris Paris Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region... , Théâtre Feydeau	Paul Dercy, after Alain-René Lesage Alain-René Lesage Alain-René Lesage was a French novelist and playwright. Lesage is best known for his comic novel The Devil upon Two Sticks , his comedy Turcaret , and his picaresque novel Gil Blas .-Youth and education:Claude Lesage, the father of the novelist, held the united... 's Gil Blas Gil Blas Gil Blas is a picaresque novel by Alain-René Lesage published between 1715 and 1735. It is considered to be the last masterpiece of the picaresque genre.-Plot summary:...
1794	Paul et Virginie ou Le Triomphe de la vertu	3 acts	13 January 1794, Paris, Théâtre Feydeau	Alphonse du Congé Dubreuil, after the novel by Jacques-Henri Bernardin de Saint-Pierre Jacques-Henri Bernardin de Saint-Pierre Jacques-Henri Bernardin de Saint-Pierre was a French writer and botanist...
1796	Télémaque dans l'île de Calypso ou Le triomphe de la sagesse	3 acts	11 May 1796, Paris, Théâtre Feydeau	Paul Dercy
1804	Ossian, ou Les bardes Ossian, ou Les bardes Ossian, ou Les bardes is an opera in five acts by the French composer Jean-François Le Sueur. The libretto, by Alphonse François "Paul" Palat-Dercy and Jean-Marie Deschamps, is based on the Ossian poems of James Macpherson , which had been translated into French by Pierre-Prime-Félicien Le...	5 acts	10 July 1804, Paris, Opéra Opera Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...	Paul Dercy and Jacques-Marie Deschamps
1807	L'inauguration du temple de la victoire	1 act	2 January 1807, Paris, Opéra	Pierre Baour-Lormian,
1807	Le triomphe de Trajan [Mostly the work of Persuis Louis-Luc Loiseau de Persuis Louis-Luc Loiseau de Persuis was a French violinist, conductor, choirmaster, teacher, composer, and theatre director.... ]	3 acts	23 October 1807, Paris, Opéra	Joseph-Alphonse Esménard
1809	La mort d'Adam et son apothéose La mort d'Adam La mort d'Adam et son apothéose is a Biblical opera in 3 acts by composer Jean-François Le Sueur with a French libretto by Nicolas-François Guillard. Le Sueur wrote the opera while working as an instructor at the Conservatoire de Musique in Paris. The opera was initially scheduled to be performed...	3 acts	21 March 1809, Paris, Opéra	Nicolas-François Guillard Nicolas-François Guillard Nicolas-François Guillard was a French librettist. He was born in Chartres and died in Paris, the recipient of a government pension in recognition of his work writing librettos. He was also on Comité de Lecture of the Paris Opéra...  after Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock was a German poet.-Biography:Klopstock was born at Quedlinburg, the eldest son of a lawyer.Both in his birthplace and on the estate of Friedeburg on the Saale, which his father later rented, young Klopstock passed a happy childhood; and more attention having been given...
unperformed	Alexandre à Babylone	3 acts	composed 1814-1825	Pierre Baour-Lormian

Sources

• Catholic Encyclopedia article
• Howard E. Smither A History of the Oratorio, Volume 3: The Oratorio in the Classical Era (University of North Carolina Press, 1977)