Georges Lamothe

Biography

Marie Émile Georges Lamothe (1842 – 15 October 1894) was a prolific French composer, pianist and harmonium player. Apart from a large number of salon pieces for the piano, he was also known as an accompanist to popular theatrical performances including puppet plays.

Career

Lamothe was born in Paris in 1842, the exact date cannot be established. Baker's Dictionary, which wrongly claims that he was born in 1837, also states that his work-list exceeded "over 1,000 op.-numbers". In contrast, the online catalogue of the French national library (Bibliothèque nationale de France), counts 503 entries under his name, which also includes arrangements of Lamothe's works by other composers. The highest opus number in this catalogue is 310, but many other works are listed without opus numbers, and around 15 to 20 opus numbers have been allocated two or three works. The exact quantity of works aside, he certainly was a very productive composer, with his first publications appearing in 1861 when he was barely 19 years of age.
His parents were Jean Paul Émile Alexandre Lamothe, a lawyer, and Marie Madeleine Désirée, née Chatelain. No information about his teachers or places of musical education has survived. He may have been a student of the Paris Conservatory, but his name is not included in publications that listed prize-winners of this institution.
The contemporary French press often described him as an organist; for example, an 1881 issue of Le Figaro called him the "organist of Her Majesty, the Queen of Spain", and, in fact, he received the title "Organiste de la Chambre royale de Sa Majesté la reine Isabella II d'Espagne" in December 1878. However, although he performed in Spain, he is not recorded as ever having spent any extended period of time at the Spanish court, so it must have been an honorary title only. Furthermore, this activity should not be confused with that of a church organist. Lamothe wrote for and performed on a portable "orgue expressif", better known as harmonium. On a number of public occasions, Lamothe promoted the products of the harmonium maker "Alexandre père et fils", for example at the World Exposition (Exposition Universelle) in Paris of 1889. An 1882 newspaper notice mentions him as giving teaching courses on the "orgue-harmonium" in the Salons Mangeot, 21 avenue de l'Opéra, Paris. As a performer on the piano and the harmonium, Lamothe enjoyed international popularity: besides performing all over France, in Spain and Portugal, he also toured through England in 1875 and the United States for two months in 1876.

Incidental music and accompaniments

Lamothe's main musical activity appears to have been writing and performing incidental music for theatrical productions, including puppet plays. In 1864, Lamothe became a member of "Les Pierrots", a Parisian group of artists convened by the actor Montrouge, alongside Jean-François Berthelier, Coquelin Cadet, Joseph Darcier, Léon Fusier, Félix Galipaux, Eugène Silvain, and others. He was also a member of the "Pupazzi" of Louis Lemercier de Neuville (1830–1918), a group of puppet players performing all over France. In Paris, these shows were frequently performed in the Théâtre Robert-Houdin, with Lamothe being a close collaborator of its founder, the magician Jean-Eugène Robert-Houdin, for whose productions he was one of the accompanists on the piano. Compositions like La Malle des Indes, Op. 161 (1876) and Une Soirée chez Robert-Houdin (1890) are dedicated to Robert-Houdin.
In his autobiography (1911), Lemercier de Neuville included a list of the accompanists that he worked with in the course of his career. It lists, among others, Georges Bizet, Charles Gounod, Gustave Nadaud, Léo Delibes, Edmond Audran, and Georges Lamothe. As composers who wrote specific music for his plays he included, besides Lamothe, Charles Domergue de la Chaussée, Olivier Métra, Émile Pessard, and Albert Renaud.

Honours

Apart from the title of the Queen of Spain's organist (1878), he was also decorated in Spain with the Cross of the Order of Isabella the Catholic. In 1879 he was made a Chevalier of the Order of Christ (from the King of Portugal, 1879), and he received the Cross of the Order of Charles III (from the King of Spain, 1885). In France, he was named an "Officier de l'Instruction Publique" in January 1890, an honour bestowed by the French government on distinguished teachers, also known as "Golden Palms" of the Ordre des Palmes académiques.

Death

Lamothe died suddenly in Courbevoie, Département Hauts-de-Seine, aged 52. According to the newspaper Le Figaro, he died from a stomach abscess; the music journal Le Ménestrel reported that he had suffered for three days from an infectious stomach disease. He was buried in the Père-Lachaise cemetery in Paris, Division 44.