French Harpsichord Music

Having already attracted attention for his exceptional gifts, Bach entered the service of the Weimar court at the age of twenty-three. This was the start of the period known as his ‘early maturity’, in which his formal and expressive experiments reflect a significant interest in French music and ‘la belle danse’. The close intertwining of French and German styles is the dominant feature of this third volume in Benjamin Alard’s recording of the complete organ and harpsichord works.

Elisabeth Jacquet de La Guerre (1665-1729) - The Complete Harpsichord Suites - Carole Cerasi (1998) {Metronome MET CD 1026}
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© 1998 Metronome Recordings Ltd. | MET CD 1026
Classical / Baroque / Harpsichord

Elisabeth Jacquet (Couperin’s senior by three years) was a remarkable girl. A member of a family of musicians, at the age of only five she attracted the benevolent attention of Louis XIV by her harpsichord playing, and subsequently was taken under the wing of his favourite, Mme de Montespan. At 18 she married the organist Marin de la Guerre and became famous for the concerts she gave at her home, in which her powers of improvisation were greatly admired. She wrote trio sonatas, an opera (the first one by a woman to be produced in France), violin sonatas that include double-stopping, and two books of Cantates francaises on Old Testament subjects.

After having already released the solo harpsichord concertos, which received several awards, Aapo Hakkinen and the Helsinki Baroque Orchestra go on with the concertos for two harpsichords, together with renowned French harpsichord player Pierre Hantaï. The sonata for two harpsichords by the oldest Bach son Wilhelm Friedemann is a welcome addition. The French harpsichordist, Pierre Hantaï, became passionately attached to the music of Bach around the age of ten.

Born in 1660 into a family of peasant farmers, Johann Joseph Fux died in 1741 as Kapellmeister at the Habsburg court in Vienna, a prestigious post that he had held for almost 30 years: an extraordinary rise in fortune and testament to both considerable gifts as a musician and, self-evidently, an inclination towards hard work and self-improvement.

If the keyboard music of Domenico Zipoli (1688-1726) is now played or remembered, it is through the gentle swing of his C major Pastorale with its chirpy central section, popular as communion music with organists. Few of them will know that the Pastorale forms part of a larger collection of Sonata dintavolatura, which were published as Book 1, with a second book which worked in the same genre but for harpsichord.

Skip Sempé is a world-renowned virtuoso harpsichord player, ensemble conductor, and the founder of the early music group Capriccio Stravagante. He has won acclaim as a solo harpsichord player with a striking control over the often inflexible tone of the instrument and as an authoritative and stylish interpreter of Baroque-era continuo realizations from figured bass.