Édouard-Victoire-Antoine Lalo (January 27, 1823 - April 22, 1892) was a French romantic composer. At sixteen Lalo went to study at the Paris Conservatoire under the conductor François-Antoine Habeneck. Afterward he found employment as a string player and teacher in Paris. He joined with friends to found the Armingaud Quartet, playing viola and second violin. Lalo's earliest surviving compositions are songs and chamber works (two early symphonies were destroyed).His marriage in 1865 to the contralto Julie Besnier de Maligny ignited an interest in opera and led him to compose stage works. Deemed excessively progressive and Wagnerian, they were were not initially well received despite their originality. This led him to dedicate most of his career to the composition of chamber music, which was in vogue, and to writing works for orchestra.