Antoine Forqueray

(b Paris, 1672; d Mantes, 28 June 1745). Son of Michel Forqueray (1650–1714/5), a violinist and dancing-master who settled in Paris in 1670.

The Mercure galant of April 1682 records that at an early age Forqueray

had the honour … of playing the basse de violon before the king, making His Majesty so pleased that he commanded that someone should teach [Forqueray] to play the bass viol … he profited so much from the lessons that … there are few who equal him.

According to his obituarist, he remained at court for five or six years and was educated with the court pages. At least six viol players were employed at court, including Marin Marais, but several sources state that he was taught only by his father, and d’Aquin noted that he was never a pupil of Marais. Forqueray often entertained the king during mealtimes and was called upon to play for foreign ambassadors. At the end of the 1689 he became ordinaire de la chambre du roi. La Borde recorded that by the age of 20 he was ‘the most accomplished viol player of his time’. He also built up a reputation as a teacher; the Duke of Orléans (the future regent) and his son Louis, the exiled Duke of Bavaria and the Duke of Burgundy were among his pupils.

In 1697 he married Henriette-Angélique Houssu, daughter of an organist and herself a harpsichordist. They lived for a time at the residence of the Prince of Carignan, where (3) Jean-Baptiste Forqueray was born. Antoine gave concerts with his wife, but the marriage was unsuccessful: his wife left him five times, describing her husband as hot-headed. They separated in 1710, after which Antoine lived in high style, neglecting his impoverished family until ordered to provide for them. In 1731 he retired to Mantes. There was some reconciliation with his family, although he altered his will several times to exclude his son: he evetually left him 20,000 livres and some valuable viols, although the bulk of his estate went to his surviving daughter.

Contemporary writings reveal Forqueray as a player of exceptional virtuosity, keenly interested in the latest developments from Italy. The Mercure de France (August 1738) describes how ‘he wished to do on the viol everything that they [the Italian violinists] could do on the violin’. The report continues that he succeeded in his ambition, translating their technical acrobatics into passage-work for the viol ‘with startling accuracy’; this made his music ‘more piquant and more recherché’ than that of Marais. Above all Forqueray possessed a brilliant gift for improvisation; his obituarist testifies to his ‘lively and fertile imagination’ and Le Blanc recalls he would ‘affect to be whimsical, fantastic and bizarre’. The regent showed his appreciation of Forqueray’s extraordinary talents by presenting him with lavish gifts that included covering him for a debt of 100,000 livres from speculation in the Mississippi company. Although Forqueray’s obituarist refers to ‘about 300 pieces’ surviving by him, apart from the book of pièces de viole published as his, by his son, in 1747 (see below), only five pièces de viole (four in F-Pn Vm7 6296), two transcriptions by Visée for theorbo (B 279152), a handful of dance melodies and a manuscript for three viols ascribed to ‘Forcroy’ (in Lm) are known. These pieces are limited in harmonic vocabulary but demonstrate a love of virtuosity and a delight in the use of high registers.