Jacques Offenbach
Born into a Judeo-German family of professional musicians, cellist Jacques
Offenbach began playing in trios in Cologne bars with his brother and sister at
the age of 9. Five years later, he was invited to Parisian salons in the company
of Franz Liszt and Anton Rubinstein. He gave lessons and launched his career in
vaudeville. Married to a Frenchwoman, father of five children, naturalized
French in 1860 and made a Chevalier de la Légion d'Honneur, his operettas
triumphed from Louis-Philippe to the Third Republic, leading the life of a
wealthy bourgeois. After the 1870 war, he took...
