Charpentier, Gustave (1860-1956)

French composer. He went into business in Tourcoing at the age of 15, but a scholarship enabled him to study music at the Lille and Paris Conservatories. At the latter he was a pupil of Jules Massenet, and won the Prix de Rome for his cantata Didon in 1887. In 1902 he founded the Conservatoire Populaire Mimi Pinson, providing free instruction in music for working-class girls. His fame rests mainly on his opera about Paris working-class life, Louise (1900).

Works Opera Louise (produced 1900) and Julien (1913).

Orchestral orchestral suite Impressions d'Italie (1889).

Vocal cantatas Didon (1887) and La Vie du poète (1892; afterwards used in Julien); symphonic drama for solo voices, chorus, and orchestra; Fête du couronnement de la Muse (later used in Louise); Impressions fausses (Verlaine) and Sérénade à Watteau for voice and orchestra (1896); Poèmes chantés and five poems from Baudelaire's Fleurs du mal for voice and piano.