Francis Poulenc was born in Paris, France on January 7, 1899. Poulenc's father was Emile Poulenc who became one of the directors of the pharmaceutical firm Rhone-Poulenc. Never one to be without money, Poulenc's composing was often viewed as more of a hobby than a necessity. Plus the fact that Poulenc never studied at the famed Paris Conservatoire or any other musical institution made it difficult for Poulenc to be accepted by his peers.

Poulenc studied piano with Ricardo Vines and composition with Charles Koechlin, although this study was limited and Poulenc was considered to be primarily a self-taught composer. During the 1920s, Poulenc became associated with a group known as Les Six that included Louis Durey, Arthur Honegger, Darius Milhaud, Germaine Tailleferre, and Georges Auric (the Les Six received their name after being compared to Russia's Big Five). Although these composers did not represent a particular school of music, they favored jazz and music hall styles and opposed the romantic and formal style of previous French composers including Claude Debussy. Poulenc was inspired by Igor Stravinsky, Darius Milhaud and Erik Satie as well as Maurice Chevalier and French vaudeville. Poulenc cared passionately about his composition and although he aspired to write grand opera, he felt that his technical shortcomings were of concern and put off writing opera for almost 40 years. His deep love of voice became apparent as he composed over 130 French art songs, many of which were set to the words of Apollinaire and Eluard. Since much of his work tended to be light in nature, Poulenc seemed to recognize that his first opera should also be in the same milieu and chose a comedy of Apollinaire as his inspiration. Les Mamelles de Tiresias (The Breasts of Tiresias) was first premiered as a play of Apollinaire in 1917, which Poulenc attended. The opera was commissioned and performed for the Paris Opera-Comique in 1947 to a lukewarm reception from Poulenc's critics.

In the early 1950's, Poulenc felt that he had all but exhausted his song writing efforts and was looking for inspiration. In 1953, Poulenc was encouraged to write a ballet for La Scala on St. Margaret of Cortona, but Poulenc was less than thrilled. Instead, he wanted a great opera libretto. The Ricordi publishers recommended a play by Georges Bernanos entitled Dialogues des Carmelites. Originally a screenplay, Dialogues was based on the novel by Gertrud von Le Fort (Die letze am Schafott (The Last to the Scaffold)) which was based on the memoirs of a Carmelite nun who was part of the convent at Compiegne. Poulenc read the play and saw it performed several times, where it was met with tremendous success. Poulenc accepted the commission and began composing in August 1953. The composition process overtook Poulenc who found a kindred spirit in Blanche de la Force, the heroine of Dialogues. By September 1st, Poulenc had already drafted the first three scenes of Dialogues and by the following March had finished the entire vocal score to the end of Act II, scene 3. With only a little more to compose, it seemed that Poulenc was on a "roll". However, his total involvement with Dialogues as well as his troubled homosexual relationship with Lucien Roubert led Poulenc to abandon Dialogues for the time being. Through the remainder of 1954, Poulenc decided to go a clinic to recover and in early 1955, decided to return to Dialogues. He finished the vocal score in August and the orchestration in June 1956. The premiere was in La Scala, Milan on January 26, 1957.

Poulenc's final opera was a one act tragedy entitled La Voix Humaine (The Human Voice) featuring a young elegant woman who has been deserted by her lover. This opera was premiered at the Paris Opera-Comique on February 6, 1959.

In addition to his three operas, Poulenc composed a number of concerti for organ, harpsichords and piano as well as masses, chamber music with only a few orchestral works including Les Biches and Model Animals. Poulenc died on January 30, 1963 in Paris.