Chevalier de Meude-Monpas

The Chevalier de Meude-Monpas (fl. c. 1780-1790) was a French composer, musician, author, and royalist of the 18th-century. Meude-Monpas was otherwise known as J.J.O. de Meude-Monpas (possibly Josse Jean-Olivier). He was a "gentilhomme-servant du roi", meaning he was on the king's payroll, and a composer and violinist,^[1] as well as a member of several academies.

Meude-Monpas was born in Paris and studied violin with Pierre Lahoussaye [fr], and composition with Giroust, but later he pretended to be one of Jean-Jacques Rousseau's pupils because he shared the man's opinions and purported to be extremely sensitive. In 1786 Meude-Monpas published six concertos for violin, with 2 violins, viola, double bass, 2 oboes and 2 horns. Like many other members of the court, he left the country during the French Revolution and served for a time in a corps under the orders of the Prince de Condé. Later, Mme de Genlis met him in Berlin where he was writing and publishing poetry. She gave the poetry a bad review, an opinion shared by Framery, who criticized it as ignorant and absurd in the Mercure de France (ann. 1788, n.26).

On May 5, 1790, Meude-Monpas had an impromptu published in which he suggested that the Duke of Aiguillon had dressed as a woman to take part in the Women's March on Versailles (this was a preexisting legend) : "We have been transported to miraculous times. / While d'Aiguil ... disguises himself as a woman, / Antoinette becomes a brave man, / Worthy of honouring the noble blood of the House of Guise."^[2] Meude-Monpas denied that he had been referring to the duke and on May 23, the Marquis de Condorcet's Chronique de Paris jeered at him and reminded the public that Meude-Monpas was a self-styled "chevalier" - in fact the son of a master goldsmith in Paris, a Mr. Josse "who would be amazed to see his youngest son has become a gentleman-servant and a chevalier (knight) in spite of his ancestors, and the Don Quixote of dukes, marquis and counts, his noble peers and friends."^[3]

An article by Camille Pelletan in Georges Clemenceau's newspaper La Justice published on April 29, 1889, describes a counter-revolutionary newspaper called "Le petit Gautier" or, more officially, Le Journal de la cour et de la ville. François Jourgniac de Saint-Méard (1745-1827) and Jean-Olivier de Meude-Moupas were notable contributors.

Meude-Monpas was known as a staunch supporter of Louis XVI and had a public reputation. Nearly a century later, he became a character in a play by Edmond de Goncourt, La Patrie en Danger, drame en cinq actes, en prose, premiered on March 19, 1889 at the Théâtre Libre, salle des Menus-Plaisirs. (see Journal des débats politiques et littéraires, March 19, 1889). Meude-Monpas is mentioned in François-Joseph Fétis's Biographie universelle des musiciens et bibliographie générale de la musique.^[4] The author notes that Meude-Monpas was a "black musketeer" (which means that he belonged to a company riding black horses, not to the other company having grey ones).

• A Dictionary of Music (Dictionnaire de musique dans lequel on simplifie les expressions et les définitions mathématiques et physiques qui ont rapport à cet art, avec des remarques impartiales sur les poètes lyriques, les vérificateurs, les compositeurs, acteurs, exécutans), 1787. Minkoff Reprint, Genève, 1981. Wentworth Press (2018).
• Réponse à la question proposée par M. l'abbé Raynal, adressée à l'Académie de Lyon : "Les Richesses toujours ont causé nos malheurs", 1788 https://catalogue.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/cb30935898h.public
• Quelques réflexions par le Chevalier J.-J.-O. de Meude-Monpas, 1789
• De l'influence de l'amour et de la musique sur les moeurs, avec des réflexions sur l'utilité que les gouvernements peuvent tirer de ces deux importantes passions, 1789
• Éloge de J. J. Rousseau: avec des anecdotes très-intéressantes relatives à ce grand homme, qui n'ont point encore été publiées, 1790. Wentworth Press (2018)
• Panthéon Littéraire, 1790

One of his concerti was recorded by Rachel Barton Pine – Cedille Records, 1997: CDR 90000 035.

A recording of his Concerto in D (1876) was included as part of a compilation of violin concertos of 18th and 19th century French composers in 1998.^[5]