Blangini, Giuseppe Marco Maria Felice

1781-1841

Italian composer, singer and teacher, who was very much the fashion in the Paris of his day. He was born at Turin, Italy, and died in Paris. Blangini was an indefatigable composer, possessed an exquisite tenor voice and was a much-sought teacher of singing, holding the post of musicdirector at various courts. At an early age he displayed a decided talent for music and at nine years old was studying in the chorister's school of the Turin Cathedral. At the age of twelve he wrote some sacred music, a vocal composition and an anthem. War drove his family from Italy in 1797, and they found refuge in France, Blangini immediately going to the French capital, where he very soon won success as a teacher and a composer of songs, and later as an opera composer. In 1802 he was given commission to complete Delia Maria's unfinished opera, La fausse Duegne; the following year his own opera Chimere et Realite was produced, and, in 1806, he wrote Nephtali ou les Ammonites. He was appointed Court conductor at Munich in 1805, in 1806 was Court conductor to Napoleon's sister, the Princess Borghese, and in 1809 held a similar position at Cassel under King Jerome. After his return to Paris in 1814 he became composer to the court, and professor of singing at the Conservatory. Grove says: "The whole fashionable world, particularly the Faubourg St Germain, thronged to him for lessons. He drew up a list of his pupils which reads like Leporello's catalogue in Don Giovanni, as it included three Queens, twelve Princesses, twenty-five Countesses, etc." Blangini was the author of thirty operas, four orchestral masses, a great many romances, and many other compositions. Of this work the romances enjoyed a longcontinued popularity.