Heugel was a French music publishing company, founded in 1839, that became one of the most prolific and ubiquitous businesses of its kind in the nineteenth and early twentieth century. It was taken over in 1980 by Alphonse Leduc and dissolved in 2014.
Founding years
The French music publishing house of Heugel was founded on 1 January 1839 in Paris by Jacques-Léopold Heugel and Jean-Antoine Meissonnier. Heugel was born in La Rochelle and was active as a music teacher in Nantes before he came to Paris. The company branded initially as "A. Meissonnier et J. L. Heugel". Until 1974, the seat of the company was at 2bis, rue Vivienne. After four years, Meissonnier sold his share to Heugel to concentrate on his own business, which was brought to success by his son, Jean-Racine Meissonnier. From then on, the company added "Au Ménestrel" to its name, alluding to the weekly music journal Le Ménestrel, which was founded in 1833 by Joseph Hippolyte L'Henry at the same address and that had been taken over by Heugel and Meissonnier. Le Ménestrel provided a convenient publicising forum for the music publishing business, also including, for a time, music supplements for the journal's subscribers. It was published by Heugel and his successors until 1940, with only a short interruption during World War I. After Meissonnier's departure, Heugel ran the company on his own for eight years, joined in July 1850 by Aimé Iweins d'Hennin, and the company was rebranded "Heugel et Cie.". In its first years, the company focused on pedagogical works, romances, collections of dance music and the series "Les Clavecinistes" that was edited by Amédée de Méreaux. It also bought the rights to works originally published by other companies, such as Le Désert by Félicien David. This was followed by new works, mainly operas, by composers such as Jacques Offenbach, Ambroise Thomas, and Léo Delibes, which proved very successful. In 1863, d'Hennin sold his share at three times the price he paid twelve years before. Heugel prudently continued the business, and also became a strong advocate for copyright issues as one of the first administrators of SACEM. For his services to French music, Heugel was made a Chevalier of the Légion d'honneur in August 1870.
Era of Henri Heugel
Jacques-Léopold's son Henri-Georges, known as Henri Heugel entered the company around 1869, but it was not until 1876 that the company was eventually renamed to "Heugel et fils", with Henri acquiring one third of the shares. Henri expanded the house considerably by acquiring collections to further enrich the catalogue. He was able to publish works by Gustave Charpentier, Gioachino Rossini and Giuseppe Verdi, as well as some of the great French composers of his time including Gabriel Fauré, Édouard Lalo, and Jules Massenet. He became known as a specialised publisher of opera scores, besides continuing to publish a large number of works for piano and songs for which there was a great demand. His success enabled him to acquire the catalogues of Georges Hartmann and Tellier and parts of the catalogues of Léon Escudier, E. Gérard, Louis Gregh, Egrot, Bruneau et Cie., and Pérégally & Parvy. In July 1892, Heugel's employee and nephew, Paul-Émile Chevalier became a co-owner of the company, and it was renamed to "Heugel et Cie.". In 1912, they renewed their contract until 1924, but Heugel's death in 1916 cut this short. Chevalier continued until 1919, when Jacques-Paul Heugel took over.
