Hélène Fleury-Roy

Hélène-Gabrielle Fleury-Roy (21 June 1876 – 18 April 1957) was a French composer and the first woman to gain a prize at the prestigious Prix de Rome for composition.

She studied with Henri Dallier, Charles-Marie Widor, and André Gedalge at the Paris Conservatory.

On her first attempt at the prize, she failed the fugue test, but the next year she tried again and succeeded with the cantata Medora (libretto: Édouard Adenis) for two male and one female voice.

[2] Hélène Fleury-Roy became a piano teacher after marrying her husband Louis Roy, a professor of mechanics at the university of Toulouse, in about 1906, and resided in Paris.

Her notable students at the conservatory included the conductor Louis Auriacombe (the future founder of the Toulouse Chamber Orchestra), composer Charles Chaynes, and violinist Pierre Dukan.