Luigi Cherubini (1760-1842); ITA

Luigi Cherubini (1760–1842) was an Italian-born composer who spent most of his career in France and became one of the most respected musicians of his age. Born in Florence, he received early training from his father and later studied with Giuseppe Sarti, acquiring a rigorous command of counterpoint and dramatic composition. After working in Italy and London, Cherubini settled in Paris in the 1780s, where he composed operas through the turbulent years of the French Revolution and Napoleonic era. His changing fortunes reflected the political transformations around him, but his reputation among musicians remained exceptionally high: Beethoven regarded him with particular admiration. In 1822 Cherubini became director of the Paris Conservatoire, a post he held for two decades, exercising considerable influence over French musical education and institutional life.

Cherubini’s music combines Classical formal discipline with dramatic intensity, contrapuntal mastery, and a growing Romantic expressiveness. His most famous opera, Médée, portrays its tragic heroine with unusual psychological force and orchestral power, while Les deux journées was widely admired in the nineteenth century. As operatic fashions changed, Cherubini increasingly concentrated on sacred and instrumental music. His Requiem in C minor, written for the anniversary of the execution of Louis XVI, was praised by Beethoven and later performed at Beethoven’s own memorial service. A second Requiem in D minor, Masses, motets, and string quartets demonstrate the breadth of his later work. Cherubini’s austere craftsmanship sometimes seemed old-fashioned to younger contemporaries, yet his synthesis of Classical structure and heightened dramatic expression made him an important bridge between the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

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Read biography at allmusic.com.