Beauchamp Pierre (II), known as Charles-Louis, *1636 Versailles, †1705 or 1719 Paris, son of Louis, French dancer and choreographer. He received an education in music and dance. From around 1650, he worked as a dancer and choreographer at the court of Louis XIV. Between 1661 and 1687, he was the first director of the Académie royale de danse, newly founded by the king. From 1666, after receiving the position of director of the royal court ballet, he divided his time between his duties at court and at the academy. He performed as a dancer until 1701, mainly in dramatic roles. He trained the first generation of dancers at the Paris Opera. He worked closely with J.-B. Lully, choreographing his operas (e.g., Cadmus et Hermione, 1673; Thésée, 1675) and ballets (e.g. Ballet de l’Impatience, 1661). Together with Lully and Molière, he co-created a new genre: comédie-ballet (e.g. Monsieur de Pourceaugnac, 1669, Le bourgeois gentilhomme, 1670). He introduced the first professional dancers to the Paris Opera stage in the ballet Le triomphe de l’Amour (1681, music by J.-B. Lully). He codified the technical achievements of classical dance to date, including establishing five basic positions for the legs and arms. He developed the principles of a dance notation system, later published by R.A. Feuillet in his work Choréographie ou l’art de décrire la danse par caractéres, figures et signes démonstratifs (Paris 1700).
