Pierre-Louis Dietsch

Pierre-Louis-Philippe Dietsch (also Dietch, Dietzch, Dietz) (17 March 1808 – 20 February 1865) was a French composer and conductor, perhaps best remembered for the much anthologized Ave Maria 'by' Jacques Arcadelt, which he loosely arranged from that composer's three part madrigal Nous voyons que les hommes.

Life and career Dietsch was born in Dijon. According to Fétis, Dietsch was a choirboy at Dijon Cathedral and studied from 1822 at Choron's Institution Royale de Musique Classique et Religieuse in Paris. In 1830, Dietsch entered the Paris Conservatory and studied with Anton Reicha. Later, with the founding of the École Niedermeyer (successor of Choron's Institution) in 1853, Dietsch taught harmony, counterpoint, and fugue in a position he held up until his death.

Dietsch composed church music as well as an opera, Le Vaisseau fantôme, ou Le Maudit des mers ("The Phantom Ship, or The Accursed of the Sea"), which was first performed on 9 November 1842 at the Paris Opera. The libretto by Paul Foucher and H. Révoil was based on Walter Scott's The Pirate as well as Captain Marryat's The Phantom Ship and other sources, although Wagner thought it was based on his scenario for Der fliegende Holländer, which he had just sold to the Opéra. The similarity of Dietsch's opera to Wagner's is slight, although Wagner's assertion is often repeated. Berlioz thought Le Vaisseau fantôme too solemn, but other reviewers were more favourable. with several modern interpretations in popular music. Nevertheless, Saint-Saëns' criticized the work itself, noting in a letter printed in The Catholic Choirmaster

Recordings Le Vaisseau fantôme has been recorded by Les Musiciens du Louvre, Grenoble under Marc Minkowski.