Ernest Reyer

Ernest Reyer, the adopted name of Louis Étienne Ernest Rey, was a French opera composer and music critic (December 1, 1823 - January 15, 1909).
Ernest Reyer was born in Marseilles. His father, a notary, did not want his son to take up a career in music. However, he did not actively block his son's ambitions and allowed him to attend classes at the Conservatoire from age six to sixteen. In 1839, when he was 16 years old, Ernest traveled to north Africa to work under his brother-in-law, head of accounting for the Treasury Department in Algeria. The job was not a good fit with Reyer's nonchalant and undisciplined temperament. From administrative documents, it is apparent that Reyer wrote innumerable youthful essays and stories, and original dance pieces. Some of his early compositions achieved local notoriety and received favorable comments in the Algerian press, including a Mass performed at the cathedral that was performed for the arrival of the Duke of Aumale in 1847.