Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges was a French violinist, composer and conductor. A contemporary of Mozart, Saint-Georges is recognized as the first known classical composer of African ancestry: his mother was a Senegalese slave in the French-Caribbean colony of Guadeloupe. Among his many talents, Saint-Georges was a prolific composer. He wrote six operas, eight symphonie-concertantes, and over a dozen violin concertos. The Op. 1 string quartets are his first compositions, and draw inspiration from Haydn’s early quartets. Later in his life, Saint-Georges conducted the Concert de la Loge Olympique, and commissioned Haydn’s six “Paris” Symphonies. He performed all of his violin concertos as the soloist with his orchestra. To top it all, Saint-Georges was a champion fencer, beating the top masters in France when he was still a teenager.