Martin-Joseph Mengal (27 January 1784 - 4 July 1851) was a Belgian composer and teacher.
Mengal came from a musical family and received horn and violin lessons as a child, and by the age of 13 played first horn at the Ghent opera. From 1804 Mengal moved to Paris to study at the Conservatoire de Paris with Frédéric Duvernoy and Charles Simon Catel, but in December the same year he joined the French military service and marched in the War of the Third Coalition against Italy, Austria and Prussia under Napoleon I.
Mengal's connections with composer Anton Reicha and with the diplomat Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord made it possible to stage his operatic work at the Paris Opéra-Comique. In 1825 Mengal returned to Ghent, becoming conductor of the Opera Orchestra in Antwerp in 1830, and shortly afterward took the same position in The Hague. Mengal was the founding director of the Royal Conservatory of Ghent in 1835 and served as director there until his death. His students there included François-Auguste Gevaert.
His operas include Les infidèles (1823, Paris), Le Vampire ou L'Homme du néant (1826, Ghent), Apothéose de Talma (1826, Ghent), and the comic opera Un jour à Vaucluse ou Le Poète ambassadeur (1830, Ghent).
A few compositions from his younger brother Jean-Baptiste Mengal (1792–1878) have also survived.
The Cemetery of Montmartre is a cemetery in the 18th arrondissement of Paris, France, that dates to the early 19th century. Officially known as the Cimetière du Nord, it is the third largest necropolis in Paris, after the Père Lachaise Cemetery and the Montparnasse Cemetery.
Daniel-François-Esprit Auber was a French composer and director of the Paris Conservatoire.
François-Auguste Gevaert was a Belgian musicologist and composer.
Joseph Méry was a French writer, journalist, novelist, poet, playwright and librettist.
The Salle Le Peletier or Lepeletier was the home of the Paris Opera from 1821 until the building was destroyed by fire in 1873. The theatre was designed and constructed by the architect François Debret on the site of the garden of the Hôtel de Choiseul on the rue Lepeletier. Due to the many changes in government and management during the theatre's existence, it had a number of different official names, the most important of which were: Théâtre de l'Académie Royale de Musique (1821–1848), Opéra-Théâtre de la Nation (1848–1850), Théâtre de l'Académie Nationale de Musique (1850–1852), Théâtre de l'Académie Impériale de Musique (1852–1854), Théâtre Impérial de l'Opéra (1854–1870), and Théâtre National de l'Opéra (1870–1873).
Jean Coralli was a French ballet dancer and choreographer, best known for collaborating with Jules Perrot in creating Giselle (1841), the quintessential Romantic ballet of the nineteenth century.
Karel Miry was a Belgian composer. He was one of the first Belgian composers to write operas to librettos in Dutch and is known as the composer of the music for De Vlaamse Leeuw, the national anthem of Flanders, for which Hippoliet van Peene wrote the lyrics.
Jean-François Le Sueur was a French composer, best known for his oratorios and operas.
Charles-Simon Catel was a French composer and educator born at L'Aigle, Orne.
Der Vampyr is an opera in three acts by Peter Josef von Lindpaintner. The German libretto by Cäsar Max Hegel was based on a work by Heinrich Ludwig Ritter, based in turn on a French melodrama by Charles Nodier, Pierre Carmouche and Achille de Jouffroy, ultimately traceable to the short story "The Vampyre" (1819) by John William Polidori, although Lindpaintner's libretto credits, erroneously, Lord Byron.
Théodore François Joseph Labarre was a French harpist and composer. He lived in Paris and in London and was awarded the Prix de Rome in 1823 as well as the Légion d'honneur in 1862.
Joseph Daussoigne-Méhul was a French composer and music educator. He served as the first director of the Royal Conservatory of Liège from 1826–1862; having been appointed to that post by William I of the Netherlands. In addition to his duties as director, he also taught courses in harmony and composition at the school. Among his notable pupils were Adolphe Samuel, César Franck, and Jean-Théodore Radoux, the latter of whom succeeded him as conservatory director. In 1859, he was made a Commander of the Order of Leopold.
Auguste Philippe de Peellaert was a Belgian officer who, after his military career, became a painter, composer, and writer.
Jean-Toussaint Merle was a French playwright and journalist.
Jean-Joseph Ader was a 19th-century French playwright, writer and historian.
Claude Wolf, called Bernard was a 19th-century French actor, singer, playwright and theatre manager.
Louis-Barthélémy Pradher was a French composer, pianist and music educator.
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Charles-Louis-Joseph Hanssens, known under the name Hanssens the elder, was a Belgian violinist, composer, conductor and theatre director.
Charles-Henri Plantade was a French classical composer and singing professor. His compositions included several operas, numerous romances, sacred music, and a sonata for harp. He taught singing at the Conservatoire de Paris and was the maître de chapelle to the courts of Louis Bonaparte in Holland and Louis XVIII in France. From 1812 to 1815 he was also the singing master and stage director of the Paris Opéra. Plantade was born in Pontoise and died in Paris at the age of 75. His elder son, Charles-François Plantade, was also a composer.
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