REICHA Anton Joseph (1770-1836), musical theorist and teacher of composition, was born at Prague, February 27, 1770, and educated chiefly by his uncle,

| Joseph Reicha (1746-1795), a clever violoncellist, who first received him into his house at Wallerstein in Bohemia, and afterwards carried him to Bonn. He! studied hard, and began to compose at a very early age,— producing, during the course of a long and active life, a vast quantity of church music, five operas, a number of symphonies, oratorios, and many miscellaneous works. Though clever and ingenious, his compositions are more remarkable for their novelty than for the beauty of the ideas upon which they are based, and display but little of the divine fire which alone can render works of art immortal. His fame is, indeed, more securely based upon his didactic works than upon the results of his theories as exemplified in his own productions. His Traité de Mélodie (Paris, 1814), Cours de Composition Musicale (Paris, 1818), Traité de Haute Composition Musicale (Paris, 1824-1826), and AH du Compositeur Dramatique (Paris, 1833) are valuable and instructive essays, containing much that is new and interesting; and, though many of the theories they set forth are now condemned as erroneous, they can scarcely be read without profit to the student.

Reicha first visited Paris in 1799. In 1802 he removed to Vienna, where he spent some happy years in close intercourse with Beethoven, and the veteran Haydn. His permanent settlement at Paris took place in 1808. In 1817 he succeeded Mehul as professor of counterpoint at the Conservatoire. In 1831 he was made a knight of the Legion of Honour; and in 1835 he was admitted as a member of the Institute in the place of Boieldieu. He died at Paris, May 28, 1836.