KREUTZER, RODOLPHE

born Nov. 16, 1766, Versailles, Fr. died Jan. 6, 1831, Geneva composer and violinist, one of the founders of the French school of violin playing, and one of the foremost improvisers and conductors of his day. Kreutzer was a pupil of the influential composer and conductor Anton Stamitz and in 1795 became professor of the violin at the Paris Conservatoire. In 1798 in Vienna he met Beethoven, who dedicated to him his Sonata in A Major for Piano and Violin, Opus 47, now known as the Kreutzer Sonata. Kreutzer did not appreciate the work and apparently never played it. He held solo violin positions at the Thtre-Italien and the Paris Opra and later was chamber musician to Napoleon and to Louis XVIII. He wrote about 40 operasof which Lodoska (1791) was particularly popularseveral ballets, 19 violin concerti, and many chamber works. His Mthode du violon, written with the violinists Pierre Baillot and Pierre Rode, and his 40 tudes ou caprices remain standard exercises for the violin.