Biography
François-André Danican Philidor was born on 7 September 1726 in Dreux and joined the royal chapel at Versailles as a boy chorister, where he learned chess alongside music. From the 1740s he first made his name in Paris and London as a chess player; his 1749 treatise L'Analyse des échecs shaped the theory of positional play for generations. At the same time he turned to opera, becoming one of the most successful stage composers of his day in Paris with opéras comiques such as Tom Jones (1765/66) and Ernelinde, princesse de Norvège (1767). From 1770 he lived mainly in London, working as a professional chess player and teacher; the Revolutionary Wars prevented his return to France from 1792 onward. Philidor died on 31 August 1795 in London.
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