Charles Lecocq
Lecocq, Charles
Born June 3, 1832, in Paris; died there, Oct. 24, 1918. French composer. A student of F. Halévy.
In 1857, Lecocq shared first prize with G. Bizet in an operetta contest organized by J. Offenbach (for Lecocq’s Le Docteur Miracle). Yet Lecocq’s compositions enjoyed no success until his Fleur de thé was produced in 1868.
Along with Offenbach, Lecocq became one of the most popular French composers of the operetta genre. Lyric and humorous, his operettas approach realistic comedy and carry on the traditions of French comic opera. The Daughter of Madame Angot (1872) and Giroflé-Girofla (1874) are two of the most popular of Lecocq’s more than 50 operettas.
REFERENCES
Iankovskii, M. Operetta: Vozniknovenie i razvitie zhanra na Zapade i v SSSR. Leningrad-Moscow, 1937.Schneider, L. Les Maîtres de l’opérette française. Paris, 1924.