Gustave Charpentier

Gustave Charpentier’s family left his native Lorraine after France’s defeat in the Franco-Prussian War and went to Tourcoing. There, while working in a knitting factory, he received his first lessons in violin and harmony. With a scholarship from the city, he was able to study at the Paris Conservatory. In 1887 he won the Prix de Rome with his cantata Didon.

Charpentier was interested in the social problems of the working class and in 1900 founded “L’Oeuvre de Mimi Pinson” and “Cocarde de Mimi Pinson”, organizations to support the poor and to aid wounded soldiers in World War I, respectively. In addition, he established the “Conservatoire Populaire Mimi Pinson” to provide artistic training for young working-class women. He was also a co-founder of the Federation of musical artists, which was part of the trade union movement CGT.

Charpentier’s musical career was mainly linked to the success of his masterpiece Louise, a sociocritical “musical novel” based on his libretto, which premiered at the Opera-Comique in 1900. Written in the spirit of naturalism, the score soon appeared in the repertory of opera houses throughout the world. A sequel under the title Julien premiered in 1913, but it was not successful. He later worked on a film version of Louise, which was directed by French film pioneer Abel Gance (1889-1981) in 1939. Subsequently, Charpentier retired as a composer.

In 1912, Charpentier was elected as a member of the Académie des Beaux-Arts and, in 1950, made a Grand Officer of the Legion of Honor. A year later he conducted for the last time his work Le Couronnement de la Muse (The Coronation of the Muse) with 1,250 performers celebrating the two-thousandth anniversary of Paris and Montmartre.