Eleutério Franco Leal

Eleutério Franco Leal was a Portuguese composer who was born and died in Lisbon, around 1758 and 1840, although the exact dates of his birth and death are not known with precision. His career belongs to the musical life of Lisbon Cathedral in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.

For much of his career he directed the musical chapel of Lisbon Cathedral, first as choirmaster from around 1780 until 1819, when he retired because of a chronic illness. Before that, he had taught at the choir seminary attached to the cathedral, the institution where the church's singers and musicians were trained.

His surviving music shows a fluent, Italianate style, close to that of David Perez. His works include four-part masses with organ, Vespers psalms, a Magnificat, a Responsorio para Maitines de Nuestra Señora dated 1817, and several works with instruments. He also wrote Regras de acompanhar, an accompaniment treatise intended for the seminary, made up largely of examples and contrapuntal exercises that progress from two to four voices in all keys with up to four sharps or flats.

His legacy is associated above all with the tradition of Lisbon's religious music and with musical teaching at the cathedral seminary, rather than with work of international reach.