Lully: Te Deum

This recording of the Poème Harmonique revitalizes Charpentier's and Lully's Te deum, two magnificent pieces of sacred music celebrating the Sun King's victory and recovery. Lully, who was of Italian origin, found the essence and style of French art, while Charpentier gave the emotion and composition methods he had learned from the Italians to the music of his country. This is the story of two musicians, two countries, two aesthetics, and two fundamental stakes. Lully became a lauded composer, outshining Charpentier and relegating him to an undeserved subpar position.

The large-scale sacred music of the French court remains among the most neglected repertories of the Baroque era. Here's an excellent place to start with it. The Te Deum, the quintessential Catholic hymn of praise, was a favored text for big moments at court, and the two examples here must be among the finest. Jean-Baptiste Lully's Te Deum, LWV 55, during whose premiere the composer fatally stabbed himself in the foot with a staff, was composed to celebrate the Sun King's recovery, via a pretty ghastly surgery, from what appears to have been a severe case of hemorrhoids. The more cheerful occasion of Charpentier's setting was a French military victory in the Low Countries. In both cases you get full-scale splendor, with chorus, brass, and orchestra in harmonically static settings.

This recording of the Poème Harmonique revitalizes Charpentier's and Lully's Te Deum, two magnificent pieces of sacred music celebrating the Sun King's victory and recovery. Lully, who was of Italian origin, found the essence and style of French art, while Charpentier gave the emotion and composition methods he had learned from the Italians to the music of his country. This is the story of two musicians, two countries, two aesthetics, and two fundamental stakes. Lully became a lauded composer, outshining Charpentier and relegating him to an undeserved subpar position.

Although Lully never held any post in the Chapelle du Roi, his influence on the development of the grand motet, so emblematic of the Grand Siècle, was of decisive importance. He wrote imposing motets celebrating the glory of God and the King for the great ceremonies at court. Of the many royal funerals, that of Queen Marie-Thérèse in 1683 was among the most grandiose. Lully’s Dies iræ and De profundis were sung there. But his most celebrated motet was undoubtedly his Te Deum, which rang out for the first time in 1677 and became the king’s favourite.

Born in Florence, the cradle of the Italian language, Jean‐Baptiste Lulli was the first Italian musician to settle and be fully accepted in France, at the prestigious and illustrious court of Versailles, the centre of refined taste. Lully not only accepted the French style, even more: he created it. His sacred music is splendidly dramatic, the orchestra is full and sonorous, with important roles for the wind and percussion instruments, a feast of colours, driving rhythms and ornaments!