Personalities | Jean-Baptiste Poquelin Molière | Early & Middle Baroque | Opera

1622–73, French

The playwright, actor and impresario Molière was the brightest star in seventeenth-century French theatre, writing plays that lived on long after his time, some of them in the form of operas. In all, 17 of Molière’s plays have been turned into 75 operas since 1706, over half of them in the twentieth century. Lully provided music for plays by Molière. So did Charpentier towards the end of Molière’s life, when he wrote music for Le mariage forcé and Le malade imaginaire. Molière came from a wealthy background. He was attracted to the theatre as a very young man, embarking on his first theatrical venture in 1643, when he was only 21. Ultimately, Molière’s plays and his actors came to the attention of King Louis XIV, who absorbed the entire company into his household in 1665.

Introduction | Early & Middle Baroque | Opera
Personalities | Claudio Monteverdi | Early & Middle Baroque | Opera

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