French Harpsichord Music

After the massive scale of the Journey to the Center of the Earth and Myths and Legends of King Arthur… projects, Wakeman was told by his record company (and his finances, and his health), "no more extravaganzas." So he produced this album with a stripped-down seven-piece band he called the English Rock Ensemble…

Among French baroque music, chamber music is relatively unknown. And yet, the works constituting the repertoire are often as well-written as those by Vivaldi or Bach, and they are not always more difficult to understand. One of the best-known composer of the genre is François Couperin, brilliant harpsichordist who used to be a musician at the French court. His Nations are one of his non-religious masterpieces.

A versatile musician and music producer. Alessandro's preference for board instruments was clear when as a child he began to play as a self-taught pianist. He also started composing at a very early age. At 14 y.o. he wrote a cycle of Mazurkas inspired by Chopin. He deepened aspects of jazz composition and silent-film music, and became a close friend with Eric James, the associate composer of Sir Charles Chaplin, until his death. In 2000, a few minutes before his performance, James put a paper on the grand piano, and in front of the audience wrote: nist of immense talent and will surely make his mark on the musical profession.

Johann Pachelbel is unfairly viewed as a one-work composer, that work being the popular Canon in D major, for three violins and continuo. He was an important figure from the Baroque period who is now seen as central in the development of both keyboard music and Protestant church music. Some have summarized his primary contribution as the uniting of Catholic Gregorian chant elements with the Northern German organ style, a style that reflected the influence of the Protestant chorale. A Lutheran, he spent several years in Vienna where he was exposed to music by Frohberger and Frescobaldi, which influenced his work with the chorale-prelude…

This is a generous selection of music from the chambers of the French mid Baroque‚ with pieces by two of its greatest masters – Marais and Sainte Colombe – alongside others by the lesser but still worthy Hotteterre and Montéclair‚ plus practically the only piece by Jacques Morel that ever gets played. The starting¬point seems to be the particular line up of Tientos‚ a Vienna based group distinguished by the fact that one of its number can double on recorder and viola da gamba.