Les maîtres du clavecin français

Description

Seen from today’s vantage points, some periods in the history of music seem to be almost unbelievably blessed with a flourishing of talents and with remarkable outputs in some particular fields. One has to think, for instance, about the German Romantic composers, who were born within a few years’ span, or about the Italian operatic talents, both in the Baroque and in the Romantic era, and so on. In spite of the impression these data cause, however, it is not by chance or by some astral influence that such concentrations appear. Talents are born every day in every corner of the world; what changes dramatically is the possibility, for a musically gifted child, to have his or her talent acknowledged soon enough for a musical career to take place, and to find the funding needed for completing a long and demanding musical education. Finally, the musical profession must be socially and economically rewarded, otherwise talented people will limit themselves to the amateur’s enjoyment of music, without being encouraged to pursue a musical activity full-time.
This combination of factors, some of which pertain to family conditions, others to the time and place of one’s birth, is not easily found; but, when it happens, the preconditions for a musical blossoming are met.
Among the several “golden ages” of Western music, the French Baroque – which I omitted mentioning earlier – is one of the most important; within it, the repertoire and style of the keyboard school is a standalone. This Da Vinci Classics album offers a stimulating and enticing panorama on the styles, genres, ideas and perspective of the French keyboard school in the Baroque era.
The album opens with a piece which was composed by a musician whose posthumous fame relies more on his organ output than on that for the harpsichord. Similar to J. S. Bach, with whom he allegedly had to compete at a kind of musical duel, Louis Marchand was best known by his contemporaries as an unrivalled master at the organ, and only secondarily as a composer and a performer of other instruments, including the harpsichord. But, very different from Bach, whose life was comparatively orderly and uneventful, and particularly marked by his Christian faith, Marchand was a picturesque figure, whose story is punctuated by scandals, mots célèbres, and a decidedly unconventional attitude. Similar to Bach, however, Marchand came from a family of musicians: and here we can observe the already-mentioned importance of coming from the right musical milieu.
Marchand held important and prestigious appointments both at the French Court – where he was responsible for the organ playing, one trimester per year – and at some of the great cathedrals; his published works are mainly in the field of organ music, and some are really ahead of their times. As concerns his harpsichord output, all that can be certainly attributed to him consists of two Suites; the earliest was issued in 1699 and reprinted in 1702 (“Livre premier”), the same year when the “Livre Second” was published. The piece recorded here is the first movement of the first Suite, a “Prélude mesuré”. This term indicates a piece in a free form, as is characteristic for the Preludes, but with an identifiable rhythmic structure, lending it a temporal structure which contrasts with the total freedom of the non-measured Prelude opening the second Book of Marchand’s harpsichord works.
Marchand was held in high esteem and deeply appreciated by his contemporaries, including Jean-Philippe Rameau. The roots of their art, however, must be found in an earlier generation, which can be identified with that of Louis Couperin (1626-1661). Here too we have a notable family of musicians, perhaps the most important in the history of the French Baroque. Louis was the first to move to Paris, together with his siblings; he had conquered the heart of noble patrons, starting with Jacques Champion, Sire of Chambonnières, and had been invited by them to Paris, where Louis’ career took off. Unfortunately, however, this was to last for just a decade, since Louis died at the early age of 35. Still, his Parisian years were extremely fecund both for him and for the capital – but also for his family; he was appointed to the post of organist at the Church of St. Gervaise, and – just as would happen with Marchand later – he held also important court appointments. One major innovation which Louis Couperin implemented was the possibility of playing non-measured preludes on the keyboard, thus bringing the extreme temporal liberty of these Preludes within the framework of tradition. And if we cannot be entirely sure of the anecdote about Bach and Marchand, we do know that there were reciprocal influences between Louis Couperin and Jakob Froberger, on the occasion of the German musician’s journey to Paris.
While it is usual to refer to Louis Couperin’s works as being organized in “suites”, as was customary at the time, as a matter of fact they were not presented in this fashion to their first recipients. Only in 1970 did a musicologist propose an organization of the musical material to constitute “Suites”, on the basis of key, style, affinity. Thus, the piece recorded here (“Branle de Basque”) formally belongs in the XII Suite, but this is a modern way of thought which has no explicit parallels in Couperin’s way of organizing his musical ideas.
Many pieces written by Jean Philippe Rameau are identified through original, and at times bizarre titles. Occasionally, the link between title and work is evident (one can think simply of La poule, a paradigmatic example of program music). On other occasions, however, the exact meaning of the title eludes us. And this, paradoxically, applies precisely to a work bearing the same name as its composer, La Rameau. We do not know with any certainty, in fact, whether the composer’s homage to his family name was intended to represent himself, or his wife, who was a skilled and appreciated singer, or the kind of music which filtered through the doors of their home. This piece, along with the others by Rameau recorded here, was originally written for violin, viola da gamba and harpsichord, thus paving the way for a novel and stimulating concept of “chamber music”. These pieces are offered here in arrangement realized by Siegbert Rampe (b. 1964), a celebrated performer and orchestra conductor who created fascinating adaptations from this repertoire, thus allowing it to be performed with reduced musical forces.
The same fate of having been written for a chamber ensemble and transcribed for the keyboard by Rampe applies to La Cupis, another piece intended as portraying a musician. In this case, the person referred to by the tile is Marie-Anne Cupis, also known as “La Camargo” (1710-1770). “La Cupis” was a celebrated professional dancer at the Royal Academy of Music in Paris; her importance was such that she had a fundamental role in the premiere of one of Rameau’s operatic masterpieces, the opéra ballet of 1733 by the title of Hippolyte et Aricie. These works, together with the one which follows them in this album, belong originally in the so-called Pièces de Clavecin en Concerts, where the reduced number of the performing forces is compensated by the liveliness and transparency of the result. No doubts can arise as to the reason for the title of the Tambourins, where the musical evocation is articulated through a skilled use of both sound and style.
Different from the preceding pieces, Rameau’s Les Cyclopes is not transcribed by a contemporary musician, but was originally composed for the harpsichord. It is found within a suite contained, in turn, in Rameau’s Livre de pieces de clavecin (1724). Here, the Cyclops are seen as the divine blacksmiths in the Greek Olympus; Rameau amuses himself (and the player, and the listener!) by suggesting a musical evocation of the din of such a gigantic forge. Several musical gestures are intended as reinforcing the imagery, and effectively manage to convey the impression of grandeur, energy, liveliness and power of the gods’ forge.
François Couperin’s Les Rozeaux (i.e. the “Reeds”) is another piece bearing a suggestive and fascinating title, but this reaches an impressive level in his Les Folies françaises ou Les Dominos. By “Domino” we must intend here a Carnival mask, capable of covering the bearer’s entire face, and topped by a cloak. This suite, in twelve movements, represents a cortege of personages, each bearing a mask and representing a quality or a situation. They include “Virginity”, for instance, whose “domino” is invisible, or “Hope”, described as arriving with a green Domino.
A first cousin of François Couperin might have cooperated with Joseph-Nicolas-Pancrace Royer, a musician born in Turin, which at the time belonged in Savoy. From there, Royer moved to Paris, where he was held in high esteem, both for his keyboard works and for some of his pieces.
Royer is the protagonist of two pieces of this Da Vinci Classics album, the first of whom is Le Vertigo, an impressive display of new virtuosity. Royer’s Marche des Schytes is an original adaptation after an operatic model, i.e. the Turkish march found in Royer’s own opera Zaide. Here, again, the quest for “special effects” on the harpsichord must have pained the composers/keyboardists, who knew what the result should have sounded like.
The last piece which remains to be discussed was written by yet another Couperin, Armand-Louis. His L’Affligée (“the afflicted”) seems to display similarities with Rameau’s L’Enharmonique, and it is permeated by an intense, though somewhat slight, vein of melancholy.
Together, these pieces represent a portrait at 360° of what could be done with a harpsichord and a sufficient quantity of inventiveness in the Baroque era; and their variety in terms both technical and musical is impressive, granting to the listener a time of fantasy, enjoyment and pleasure.
Chiara Bertoglio ©2023