Charles Louis Ambroise Thomas (1811 - 1896), to give his full name, was a composer of operas that were much favoured in his time but less well-known today. He studied at the Paris Conservatoire, winning the Prix de Rome, and went on to be a long-standing professor there where he was strictly conservative in his approach to the curriculum not favouring the influence of ‘modern’ composers such as Fauré and Franck, or even of older composers such as Rameau. The opera Raymond, or Le secret de la Reine, drew on the story of the man in the iron mask but the details need not detain us as this delightful, if melancholic little piece (arranged for string orchestra by Andrew Moore), appears in the overture but makes no further appearance in the opera.