Editing Pierre Baillot

{{Short description|French violinist and composer (1771–1842)}}
{{Infobox person
| image              = Pierre Baillot.jpg
| caption            = Etching of Baillot, {{circa}} 1810, by [[Jean-Baptiste Singry]]
| birth_name         = Pierre Marie François de Sales Baillot
| birth_date         = 1 October 1771
| birth_place        = [[Passy]], [[Paris, France]]
| death_date         = 15 September 1842
| death_place        = Paris
| nationality        = France
| occupation         = Violinist {{br}}
Composer
| years_active       = 1791-1833
}}

'''Pierre Marie François de Sales Baillot''' ({{IPA|fr|pjɛʁ maʁi fʁɑ̃swa də sal bajo}}; 1 October 1771 – 15 September 1842) was a French [[violin]]ist and [[composer]] born in [[Passy]]. He studied the violin under [[Giovanni Battista Viotti]] and taught at the [[Conservatoire de Paris]] together with [[Pierre Rode]] (also a pupil of Viotti) and [[Rodolphe Kreutzer]], who wrote the Conservatoire's official violin method (published in the early 19th century). He was sole author of the instructional ''L'Art du violon'' (1834). Baillot's teachings had a profound influence on technical and musical development in an age in which virtuosity was openly encouraged. He was leader of the [[Académie Royale de Musique|Paris Opéra]], gave solo recitals and was a notable performer of [[chamber music]].

==Biography==

===Early life===
Pierre Baillot, who was associated with Rode and Kreutzer in the compilation of the celebrated ''Methode du Violon'', was born at [[Passy]], near [[Paris]], and became one of the best violinists of his time. His eminence in his profession was not obtained without a long struggle against great difficulties, for at the age of twelve he lost his father, who had kept a school, and became dependent upon friends for his education. His musical talent was remarkable at an early age, and he received his first instruction from an Italian named Polidori. At the age of nine, he was placed under a French teacher named Sainte-Marie,{{cn|date=August 2022}} whose training gave him the severe state and methodical qualities by which his playing was distinguished.

At the age of ten, he heard [[Viotti]] play one of his concertos, becoming his model. When his father died a year or two later, the [[intendant]] of Corsica, [[Claude-François Bertrand de Boucheporn|M. de Boucheporn]], sent him, with his own children, to [[Rome]], where he was placed with Pollani, a pupil of [[Pietro Nardini|Nardini]], under whom he made rapid progress, and soon began to play in public. He was, however, unable to follow directly in the path of his profession, and for five years he travelled with his benefactor, acting as private secretary.

===Career===
In 1791, he returned to Paris,<ref name=Musicologie>{{cite web|last=Musicologie|title=Baillot Pierre Marie François de Sales 1771-1842|url=http://www.musicologie.org/Biographies/b/baillot_pierre.html|publisher=Musicologie.org|accessdate=22 February 2012|language=fr}}</ref> and Viotti secured a place for him in the opera orchestra. But on being offered a position in the Ministère des Finances, he gave up his operatic work, and for some years devoted only his leisure to the study of the violin. He served in the army for twenty months, after which he once more determined to take up music as a profession, soon appearing in public with a concerto by Viotti. This performance established his reputation, and he was offered a professorship of violin playing at the Conservatoire, then recently opened.

His next appointment was to the private band of [[Napoleon]], after which he travelled for three years in Russia with the violoncello player Lemare. Returning to [[Paris]], he established concerts for chamber music, which proved successful, and built up for him a reputation as a quartet player. He frequently performed together with the Polish pianist and composer [[Maria Agata Szymanowska]].

Baillot travelled again, visiting the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], and England, and then he became leader of the opera band in Paris and of the royal band. In March 1825, while serving as concertmaster of the Paris Opéra, Baillot and [[Luigi Cherubini]] evaluated [[Felix Mendelssohn]]'s application for admission to the Paris Conservatory by playing his Quartet for Piano and Strings in B minor. Mendelssohn was only 16 years old. An anecdote mentioned that, overcome with emotion, Baillot approached the young composer after the performance and, without uttering a word, simply embraced him.<ref>{{cite journal|journal=Chameleon Arts Ensemble |title=Season Program Notes|author=Gabriel Langfur|date=October 2013}}</ref>

Baillot made a final tour in [[Switzerland]] in 1833, and died in [[Paris]] in 1842.

==Legacy==
Baillot is considered to have been the last distinguished representative of the great classical school of violin playing in Paris. In his ''L'Art du Violon'' he points out the chief distinction between the old and the modern style of violin playing to be the absence of the dramatic element in the former, and its predominance in the latter, thus enabling the executive art to follow the progress marked out by the composer, and to bring out the powerful contrasts and enlarged ideas of more modern musical compositions. After the time of Baillot and his contemporaries, the style of [[Paganini]] became predominant in Paris, but the influence of the Paris school extended to Germany, where [[Louis Spohr|Spohr]] must be considered the direct descendant artistically of Viotti and Rode.

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==External links==
* {{IMSLP|id=Baillot, Pierre}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Baillot, Pierre}}
[[Category:1771 births]]
[[Category:1842 deaths]]
[[Category:18th-century French male musicians]]
[[Category:French male classical violinists]]
[[Category:18th-century French violinists]]
[[Category:Academic staff of the Conservatoire de Paris]]
[[Category:Burials at Montmartre Cemetery]]
[[Category:19th-century French violinists]]
[[Category:19th-century French male musicians]]
[[Category:French Classical-period composers]]
[[Category:French male classical composers]]
[[Category:French Romantic composers]]
[[Category:Musicians from Paris]]
[[Category:Pupils of Giovanni Battista Viotti]]
[[Category:French string quartet composers]]
[[Category:Composers for violin]]