Jean-Marie Leclair

Composer and choreographer, born in Lyon, SC France. From a family of musicians, he is considered the founder of the French violin school, by adapting the style of Corelli. At first a dancer in the Lyon opera, he became maître de ballet in Turin, then for Louis XV in 1733. He settled in Paris at the court of La-Haye (1738–43) as theatre director of his formal pupil, the Duc de Grammont. His works include sonatas published from 1723, concertos, entertainments, ballets, and also an opera in the style of Rameau, Scylla et Glaucus.

Jean-Marie Leclair, also known as Jean-Marie Leclair the Elder, (Lyon May 10, 1697 - Paris October 22, 1764) was a Baroque violinist and composer.

Leclair left his native Lyon and studied dance and the violin in Turin. Leclair had returned to Paris in 1723, where he played at the Concert Spirituel, the main semi-public music series.

In 1730 Leclair married for the second time. Named ordinaire de la musique by Louis XV in 1733, Leclair resigned in 1737 after a clash with Guidon over control of the musique du Roy.

Leclair was then engaged by the Princess of Orange, a fine harpsichordist and former student of Handel, and from 1738 until 1743 served three months annually at her court, working in The Hague as a private maestro di cappella for the remainder of the year.

Leclair was renowned as a violinist and as a composer.

In 1758, after the break-up of his second marriage, Leclair purchased a small house in a dangerous Parisian neighborhood, where he was found stabbed to death in 1764.

His brothers Jean-Marie Leclair the Younger (1703–77), Pierre Leclair (1709–84) and Jean-Benoît (1714-after 1759) were also musicians.