The French composer Charles-François Gounod is known for his Ave Maria, a melody he superimposed over a work to be found in The Well-Tempered Clavier composed by Johann Sebastian Bach more than a century before. He is also known for two canonical operas, Faust and Roméo et Juliette.

... More information Gounod studied music in Italy, and the first work of his that we know to have been performed in public was a mass, heard at the Church of San Luigi di Francesi on May 1, 1841. For years thereafter, he seems to have given serious thought to joining the priesthood, although such thoughts came to naught.

His first great popular success was another mass, the Saint Cecilia Mass, performed in the Church of Saint Eustache, in Paris, on Saint Cecilia’s Day. November 22, 1855. The first performance of Faust came four years later, and his operatic take on Shakespeare’s great romance was first performed in 1867. Less information