GREAT

ITALIAN AND FRENCH

COMPOSERS

BY

GEORGE T. FERRIS



Copyright, 1878, By D. APPLETON AND COMPANY.




NOTE.

The task of compressing into one small volume suitable sketches of the
more famous Italian and French composers has been, in view of the extent
of the field and the wealth of material, a somewhat embarrassing one,
especially as the purpose was to make the sketches of interest to
the general music-loving public, and not merely to the critic and
the scholar. The plan pursued has been to devote the bulk of space to
composers of the higher rank, and to pass over those less known with
such brief mention as sufficed to outline their lives and fix their
place in the history of music. In gathering the facts embodied in
these musical sketches, the author acknowledges his obligations to the
following works: Hullah's "History of Modern Music"; Fétis's "Biographie