Geneviève Thibault de Chambure

In 1967 she founded the Laboratoire d'organologie et d'iconographie musicale at the CNRS. When the American musicologist Barry S. Brook started conceiving in 1969 the international project for research of visual sources for music and the systematic cataloguing of music iconography represented in artworks, Mme de Chambure was his key advisor and when the project was officially founded in August 1971 in St. Gall, she became with him and Harald Heckmann co-president of the Répertoire International d'Iconographie Musicale (RIdIM). Her Laboratoire d'organologie et d'iconographie musicale, which was the first national center for the research of music iconography, became affiliated with RIdIM as its French national center.

Geneviève Thibault de Chambure has been president of the French association of musicologists Société française de musicologie (1967-1970).

Geneviève, comtesse Hubert de Chambure Thibault (20 June 1902, Neuilly-sur-Seine – 31 August 1975, Strasbourg) was a French musicologist associated with the revival of interest in early music. She graduated from the Sorbonne in 1920 with a thesis on John Dowland, and then continued the work with André Pirro on her doctoral thesis on the fifteenth-century chanson, which she never completed. In 1925 co-founded the Société de musique d'autrefois, designed to promote the publication de musical texts (from 1954) and a magazine les Annales musicologiques (from 1955). After her marriage in 1931 she stopped musical and scholarly activities, gave birth to six children, and alternated her life between Vietnam and France. After the death of her husband Hubert Pelletier de Chambure (1903-1953), she returned permanently to Paris, where in June 1953 she resumed her scholarly activities and organization of concerts. From 1961 to 1973, she was curator of the historical instrumentals of the Conservatoire de Paris - in addition to having amassed her own private collection. She was an important muse and teacher to the first generation of baroque specialists, including young Americans in Paris - William Christie (harpsichordist) and soprano Judith Nelson.