Léon Fréret

Léon Fréret was a French bass who sang at the Paris Opéra for more than twenty years, in the small parts that fill out a grand opéra. Born at Cherbourg, the son of a naval sculptor, he debuted at the Salle Le Peletier on 14 July 1856 as a huntsman in Guillaume Tell. He created Sadoc in Gounod's La reine de Saba in 1862 and a rajah in Massenet's Le roi de Lahore in 1877, and was Reinmar von Zweter in the Paris Tannhäuser of 1861. He sang at the Concerts du Conservatoire as a sociétaire from 1864 to 1889.