Georges Bizet

Georges Bizet (Alexandre César Léopold Bizet; 25 October 1838 – 3 June 1875) was a French composer of the Romantic era. Best known for his operas in a career cut short by his early death, Bizet achieved few successes before his final work, Carmen, which has become one of the most popular and frequently performed works in the entire opera repertoire.

See other composers :

1. Johann Christoph Friedrich Bach
2. Mily Alexeyevich Balakirev
3. Béla Bartó
4. Friedrich Baumfelder
5. Ludwig van Beethoven

George Bizet(1838-1875) is mainly known as a great opera composer, whose works Les Pêcheurs de Perles, L´Arlésienne and most of all Carmen belong to the core operatic repertoire.
Carmen was not initially well-received but soon received praise from famous contemporaries like Debussy, Saint-Saëns and Tchaikovsky, after which it became something of a cult opera (Brahms is said to have attended over twenty performances of it). However, Bizet did not live to see its success as he died from a heart attack only months after Carmen´s first performance.
Bizet was a highly gifted pianist, but the music he wrote for this instrument has never entered the canon, except perhaps the masterly Jeux d´enfants for four hands. Other works include the Chants du Rhin, Variations chromatiques (admired and recorded by Glenn Gould) and Chasse fantastique, a brilliant scherzo reminiscent of Alkan or Liszt.

Source by: pianosintheparks.com