Leslie Stuart

Leslie Stuart (1864-1928) was a British songwriter best remembered as the composer of the hit show Florodora. He began writing popular songs as a teenager first for blackface and vaudeville performers and eventually for more legitimate shows and revues. Florodora (1899) written in collaboration with London's most fashionable librettist Owen Hall was a musical-comedy sensation. Its combination of the traditional slow love ballads and waltzes with more rhythmic and long-lined numbers made it a worldwide success. He continued to compose through the first decade of the 20th century laying the groundwork for the coming innovations in British and American musical theater.