FERDINANDO

PAER (1771-1839)  , Italian musical composer, was born at Parma on the 1st of June 1771 . He studied the theory of music under the violinist Ghiretti, a pupil of the Conservatoire della Pieta de' Turchini at Naples . His first opera, La Locanda de' vagebondi, was published when he was only sixteen; others rapidly followed, and his name was soon famous throughout Italy . In 1797 he went to Vienna, where his wife, the singer Riccardi, had obtained an engagement at the opera; here he produced a series of operas, including his La Camilla ossia it Sotteraneo (1799) and his Achille (18ot) . In 1803 he was appointed composer to the court theatre at Dresden, where his wife was also engaged as a singer, and in 1804 the life appointment of Hofkapellmeister was bestowed upon him by the elector . At Dresden he produced, inter alia, Il Sargino (1803), an opera which obtained a wide popularity, and Leonora (1804), based on the same story as Beethoven's Fidelio . In 1807 Napoleon while in Dresden took a• fancy to him, and took him with him to Warsaw and Paris at a salary of 28,000 francs . In 1812 he succeeded Spontini as conductor of the Italian opera in Paris . This post he retained at the Restoration, receiving also the posts of chamber composer to the king and conductor of the private orchestra of the duke of Orleans . In 1823 he retired from the Italian opera in favour of Rossini . In 1831 he was elected a member of the Academy, and in 1832 was appointed conductor of his orchestra by King Louis Philippe . He died on the 3rd of May 1839 .

Paer wrote in all 43 operas, in the Italian style of Paesiello and Cimarosa . His other works, which include nine religious compositions, 'thirteen cantatas, and a short list of orchestral and chamber pieces, are of little importance; in any case the superficial quality of his compositions was such as to secure him popularity while he lived and after his death oblivion . See R . Eitner, Quellen-Lexikon (Leipzig, 1902), vii . 277, sqq., where a list of his works is given .