Jean-Baptiste Lully

Jean-Baptiste Lully was born in Florence, the son of a miller, and arrived in France as a boy to serve in an aristocratic household. He danced his way into favor, literally: performing in court ballets alongside the young Louis XIV, he became the king's composer and eventually held a royal monopoly that gave him control over opera in France. He essentially invented French opera, fitting music to the rhythms of the French language, and ran his company with ruthless business instinct.

His death became legend. While conducting a celebration of the king's recovery from illness, he struck his own foot with the long staff he used for beating time, and the wound turned gangrenous.

Start with the music for Le bourgeois gentilhomme, his collaboration with the playwright Molière, where the pomp of the French court comes with a wink.