Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges

On 9 April 1787, in a room at Carlton House, the Prince of Wales watched two of the strangest celebrities in Europe cross blades. One was the Chevalière d'Éon — a fifty-nine-year-old French diplomat and spy who fenced in women's clothes. The other was a man in a crimson coat whom the fencing masters of Paris and London held to be the finest swordsman alive. He was also a violinist, the conductor of one of the best orchestras in Europe, and the son of an enslaved woman from Guadeloupe.

His name was Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges. Paris adored him and Paris refused him. When he was put forward to run the Opéra in 1776, three of its leading singers petitioned Marie Antoinette that their honour would never permit them to take orders from a mulatto; he withdrew his name. Sixteen years later he raised a legion of a thousand free men of colour for the Republic — which then jailed him, without charge, for thirteen months. He is the earliest known composer of African ancestry in the European classical tradition to see his music into print. Three years after his death, Napoleon restored slavery in the colonies. The scores stopped being reprinted, and stayed unprinted for the better part of two hundred years.

Guadeloupe to Paris

The lifeline

1745

Born at Baillif, Guadeloupe, to Nanon, an enslaved Senegalese woman, and a French planter

1753

Brought to France at seven; at thirteen, into Paris's foremost fencing academy

1773

Publishes six string quartets and takes command of Le Concert des Amateurs

1776

Blocked from directing the Paris Opéra by a petition to the Queen

1792

Raises the Légion St.-Georges — a thousand free men of colour

1799

Dies in Paris at 53, in a friend's rooms, his music already going quiet

By the numbers

The measure of him

Violin concertos — most of them written for himself to play

Haydn symphonies his orchestra commissioned — Nos. 82–87, the "Paris" set — premiered under his direction

1,000

Free men of colour in the Légion St.-Georges, 1792 — the first corps of its kind in Europe

Months in prison, arrested without charge in September 1793 and freed in October 1794

What he made, led and won

The work

1772

Debut as soloist with Le Concert des Amateurs, playing two violin concertos of his own composition.

1773

Six string quartets, Op. 1 — among the first quartets written in France, and the earliest known to be published by a composer of African descent. The same year he takes over the Concert des Amateurs, which Paris soon rates the finest orchestra in Europe.

1777

Ernestine, his first opéra comique — to a libretto by Choderlos de Laclos, who would write Les Liaisons dangereuses five years later. It closed after a single night.

1780

L'Amant anonyme — of his six operas, the only one whose score survives complete.

1785–87

The Paris symphonies. His second orchestra, the Concert de la Loge Olympique, commissions six symphonies from Joseph Haydn (Hob. I:82–87). Saint-Georges conducts the premieres.

1792

Colonel of the Légion St.-Georges. Roughly 800 infantry and 200 cavalry, raised from free men of colour. His lieutenant-colonel is Thomas-Alexandre Dumas — father of the novelist.

Refused, then restored

Recognition

In his lifetime, and after

1776: three of the Opéra's leading singers petitioned the Queen rather than answer to him; he withdrew his candidacy
Jailed for thirteen months without charge by the Republic he had armed
His legion was disbanded and his command taken from him; he died in reduced circumstances in 1799
1802: Napoleon restored slavery in the French colonies. His scores went out of print — and stayed out for nearly two centuries

Today

His concertos, quartets and symphonies concertantes are recorded complete and back in the concert repertoire
L'Amant anonyme is staged again by opera companies on both sides of the Atlantic
2001: Paris renamed the rue Richepance — after a general who helped restore slavery in Guadeloupe — the rue du Chevalier-de-Saint-George
Scholars have retired the old nickname "the Black Mozart"; he was never anyone's second

The island he left at seven

Baillif, Guadeloupe

He was born on the leeward coast of Basse-Terre, beneath the volcano La Soufrière, on a plantation worked by enslaved people — one of whom was his mother. His father, a planter, acknowledged him, took him to France, and bought him the education of a nobleman. Guadeloupe gave him a name and a birth certificate that Paris would never quite let him outrun. He sailed at seven and, so far as the record shows, never went back.

His age when he left the island for France, in August 1753

~6,700 km

The Atlantic crossing from Basse-Terre to the coast of France

1794 → 1802

France abolished colonial slavery, then Napoleon restored it

"Their honour and the delicacy of their conscience would never permit them to submit to the orders of a mulatto." — Petition of three leading singers of the Paris Opéra
to Marie Antoinette, January 1776

He withdrew his name rather than force the Queen to choose. The best musician in Paris never got the job.