Collin (Colin) de Blamont, François

Collin (Colin) de Blamont, François, prominent French composer; b. Versailles, Nov. 22, 1690; d. there, Feb. 14, 1760. He commenced his musical training with his father, Nicolas Colin, who served as ordinaire de la musique du roi, then entered the service of the Duchess of Maine when he was 17, becoming a pupil of Lalande. In 1719 he was made surintendant de la musique de la chambre, and, upon Lalande’s death, was named his successor as a maître de musique de la chambre (1726). He received Letters of Nobility (1750) and was made Chevalier of the Order of St. Michel (1751). With Fuzelier, he created the ballet héroïque with their Vestes grecques et romaines (1723). He publ. the polemical book Essaie sur les goûts anciens et modernes de la musique françoise relativement aux paroles d’opéra (Paris, 1754), which was aimed primarily at Rousseau.

Works

DRAMATIC: Les Pestes grecques et romaines, ballet héroïque (Paris, July 13, 1723; in collaboration with Fuzelier); Le Retour des dieux sur la terre, divertissement (for the marriage of Louis XV, 1725); La Caprice d’Erato ou Les Caractères de la Musique, divertissement (1730); Endymion, pastorale héroïque (Paris, May 17, 1731); Les Caractères de l’amour, ballet héroïque (1736); Les Fêtes de Thétis, ballet héroïque (Versailles, Jan. 14, 1750). other: Several secular cantatas; numerous “airs sérieux et à boire”; a vol. of motets, which includes a Te Deum (Paris, 1732).

Bibliography

C. Massip, F. C.d.B.: Musicien du roi (diss., Paris Cons., 1971).

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire