Audrey French

French Manor, Simsbury
 Connecticut, US

**Audrey Marie Pontmercy, Lady French** (*née* **Pontmercy**; born January 27, 1971) is a French-American composer, violinist, conductor, educator, author, and humanitarian who is the director of the National Symphony Orchestra and the Washington National Opera. She is the current first lady of the United States, assuming the role when her husband, Niles French, became the 48th president of the United States. She is one of the most significant American and French cultural personalities of the 21st century. According to music critic Hugh Henahan, she is "one of the most prodigiously talented and successful musicians in American history".

Raised on Paris, France, French is a graduate of Oxford University. Following her time in Oxford she was a student of legendary American composer and conductor John Williams. Audrey married Niles in 1995, and they have five children.

French campaigned for her husband's presidential bid throughout 2023 and 2024. As first lady, French plans to be a role model for women and promote the arts, education, disability awareness among America's youth and support the LGBTQ+ community. She supports up and coming designers and was considered a fashion icon. As a humanitarian, she devoted much of her time to UNICEF, to which she had contributed since 2000. Then, she worked in some of the poorest communities of Africa, South America, and Asia from 2007 to present. In December 2013, she received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in recognition of her work as a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador.

## Early life

Audrey Marie Pontmercy was born on 27 January 1971 to Claude Pontmercy and Josephine de Givenchy, she was baptised a Notre-Dame de Paris on the 30th of the same month. Her uncle was famous fashion designer Hubert de Givenchy and she was also descended from Napoleon I and painter Claude Monet. She started playing the violin at age 3 and her father wrote

"She could play it faultlessly and with the greatest delicacy, and keeping exactly in time. ... At the age of five, she was already composing little pieces, which she played to her teacher who wrote them down."

By age 10, she was already competing in international competitions and composing symphonies. She was known to write pieces for the musical ensemble at Notre-Dame where she and her family attended Mass. She started touring at age 15 before stopping at the age of 17 when she was accepted at Oxford.

## Education and Early Career

Pontmercy was inspired to follow her brother to Oxford University, which she entered in 1988. She majored in music and minored in art history, graduating *cum laude* with a Bachelor of Arts in 1993 after completing a 99-page senior thesis titled "Wagner, Nietzsche, and Jung: A Need for Mythology in Modern Art" under the supervision of Frederick Wallace.

While at Oxford, she met a behavioural economics student by the name of Niles French. The two dated for a few years before becoming engaged and then marrying in the American Cathedral in Paris in an Anglo-Catholic ceremony conducted in Latin using the Sarum Rite. A Roman Catholic priest later blessed the union due to Pontmercy being a Roman Catholic unlike her husband. The following fall her husband was elected as the youngest senator in US history and she moved with him as he returned to the United States to represent Connecticut in the Senate.

## Career

Once arriving in the United States, French studied, for three years, in Boston under composer John Williams during the day before returning to Washington at night in order to be with her husband and their young children. Upon Williams' recommendation, she was chosen as the director of the National Symphony Orchestra and the Washington National Opera both posts she took in 2003 and holds to this day.

As a composer, French has adapted Arthur Miller's *Death of a Salesman*, Amor Towles' *A Gentleman in Moscow*, Tolstoy's *War and Peace*, and Dostoevsky's *Brothers Karamazov* into operatic form. She has also written various symphonies and concertos becoming one of the most prolific American composers since Leonard Bernstein, George Gershwin, and Aaron Copland. As a violinist, French is often seen playing with the *Sellière* Stradivarius once owned by Charles IV of Spain.

She has also worked as an Ambassador for UNICEF, travelling across over 50 countries in order to raise awareness for extreme poverty, violence, and extremism and their effects on the worldwide population of underprivileged children.

## First Lady

On November 3, 2024, her husband was elected as President of the United States. He is set to be inaugurated on noon January 20, 2025 at which point she will become the First Lady of the United States. She is the first Francophone First Lady, first First Lady from France, third foreign First Lady, and the second non-native Anglophone First Lady. She is the first First Lady to have a day job. As First Lady, French plans to be a role model for women and promote the arts, education, disability awareness among America's youth and support the LGBTQ+ community.

## Extramarital Affair

In 2022, during her husband's tenure as President pro-tempore and Secretary of the Treasury, it was revealed on Fox News, by Bill O'Reilly, that French engaged in an extramarital affair. French later issued a public apology to the public and the two entered couple's therapy before concluding treatment several months later.

## Personal Life

French is extremely silent about her private life wanting to shield herself and her children form her husband's public life. In 2000 the couple purchased a mansion in Washington DC where they live with their five children and their Pembroke Welsh corgi Winston . The house was owned by William Howard Taft following his presidency and during his tenure as Chief Justice. While in Connecticut, they stay at the family seat in Simsbury. They have also been known to visit their country homes in her mother-in-law's native Quebec. Following the birth of each of their children, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and the Duke and Duchess of Sussex named French, her husband, and her in-laws as godparents.

## Distinctions

French has been the recipient of various prestigious music awards including the International Queen Elisabeth Grand Prize (2000), the Beethoven Prize (2003), and the Beethoven Ring (2005)

In December 2013, she received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, by President Obama in recognition of her work as a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador.