Édouard Lalo

Édouard-Victoire-Antoine Lalo (27 January 182322 April 1892) was a French composer, violist, violinist, and academic teacher. His most celebrated piece is the Symphonie Espagnole, a five-movement concerto for violin and orchestra that remains a popular work in the standard repertoire. Biography Lalo was born in Lille, in the northernmost part of France. He attended the conservatoire in that city in his youth. Beginning at age 16, he studied at the Paris conservatoire under François Antoine Habeneck. Habeneck conducted student concerts at the conservatoire from 1806 and became the founding conductor of the Orchestre de la Société des Concerts du Conservatoire in 1828. For several years, Lalo worked as a string player and teacher in Paris. In 1848, he joined with friends to found the Armingaud Quartet, in which he played the viola and later, second violin. His earliest surviving compositions are songs and chamber works. Two early symphonies were destroyed. In 1865, Lalo married Julie Besnier de Maligny, a contralto from Brittany. She encouraged Lalo’s early interest in opera and led him to compose works for the stage, most notably the opera, Le Roi d’Ys. Despite their originality, th