Italian by birth, Lully made his career in France, where he rose from the position of a page to Mlle de Montpensier to that of Composer of the King’s Music, Master of Music to the Royal Family, and to a position of complete control of all musical performances that involved singing throughout. He collaborated with Molière and with Corneille, and, more particularly, with the poet Quinault, creating comédies-ballets and tragédies lyriques, in both of which there was an element of dance (a French royal preoccupation). The most important French composer of his period, his development of the French overture—with its introductory, slow dotted rhythms and ensuing fugal section—was influential, as was his insistence on orchestral discipline, particu...