Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne (composer)

Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne (Moyne) (born April 3, 1751 in Eymet , † December 30, 1796 in Paris ) was a French composer .

He grew up with his uncle, who was Kapellmeister in Périgueux . In 1770 he went to Berlin and studied under JG Graun , Kirnberger and JAP Schulz . After a stay in Warsaw , where his opera Le bouguet de colette was premiered, he went to Paris around 1780 to perform his first serious opera Electre , which he dedicated to Marie Antoinette . Gluck , whose ideas of the reform opera the composer wanted to imitate, distanced himself from the work, which was not well received. Lemoyne then turned to Niccolò Piccinni as a role model.

Although it failed at its premiere, Electre is Lemoyne's most interesting work. It uses short and free forms with good effect and reuses musical material in a technique similar to the leitmotif . His recitative style is sometimes highly expressive, but the orchestration is sometimes awkward, and the basic musical creativity seems questionable, especially in non-declamatory, lyrical passages. Later, his technique became more sophisticated but less original, and his operas barely aroused enthusiasm.

literature

• Association of Scholars: General German conversation lexicon for the educated of every class. Volume 6, Gebrüder Reichenbach, Leipzig 1840, p. 499