Joseph Dupont (composer)

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Joseph Dupont

Joseph Dupont (born January 3, 1838 in Ensival , Verviers , † December 21, 1899 in Brussels ) was a Belgian violinist, composer and conductor .

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Joseph Dupont, the son of a grocer, who was organist, founder and conductor of the Ensival Harmoniemusikverein in his free time, gave his sons a thorough musical education after their first lessons. The older brother Auguste Dupont (* 1827) studied piano with Joseph Daussoigne-Méhul and began a career as a concert pianist before becoming a professor at the Brussels Conservatory.

Joseph Dupont studied violin at the Liège Conservatory from 1848 with François Dupont (1821–1861), then at the Brussels Conservatory with Hubert Léonard , where he received the Premier Prix diploma in 1862 . This was followed by a position as first violinist at the Monnaie Opera in Brussels and at the same time he took composition lessons with François-Joseph Fétis . In 1861 he received second prize in the Belgian Prix ​​de Rome for music with the cantata Agar dans le désert and in 1863 he won first prize in the same competition for the cantata Paul et Virginie .

After the four-year study tour through Germany, France and Italy made possible by the Prix de Rome, he became conductor at the Warsaw Italian Opera in 1867 and at the Imperial Theater in Moscow in 1871. In 1872 he returned to Belgium, where he became professor of harmony at the Brussels Conservatory. Almost at the same time he became conductor at the Monnaie Theater, and between 1886 and 1889 he shared the post of director of the opera house with the tenor Alexandre Lapissida (1839–1907). After taking over the direction of the Concerts populaires de musique classique from the sick Henri Vieuxtemps in 1873 , at the age of about 40 he was one of the capital's most influential musicians.

Dupont, who was a great admirer and promoter of Richard Wagner's music , often left the baton to foreign conductors, including Richard Strauss , Edvard Grieg , Hermann Levi , Hans Richter and Nicolai Rimski-Korsakow . During his conducting career, Dupont conducted the orchestra at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden in London several times .

Joseph Dupont composed several orchestral works, religious works and songs that, with a few exceptions, were not printed.

A few months before his death, he became a member of the Académie royale des Sciences, des Lettres et des Beaux-Arts de Belgique in the visual arts department.

Individual evidence

  1. Revue belge de Musicologie / Belgisch Tijdschrift voor Muziekwetenschap 2006
  2. ^ François-Joseph Fétis and Arthur Pougin Supplément Volume of the Biographie universelle des musiciens et bibliographie générale de la musique (1878)
  3. Thierry Levaux: Le Dictionnaire des Compositeurs de Belgique du Moyen Age à nos jours , p 207-208, Editions: "Art in Belgium" in 2006, ISBN 2-930338-37-7