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Notes

                  1.              A General History of Music, From the Earliest Ages to the Present Period (1789), vol. 2. (New York: Dover Publications, 1957), 380. Selections from Burney's essay on Purcell, pages 375-416, are reprinted in Michael Burden, Purcell Remembered, 139-141.

                  2.              See "Purcell manuscript acquired by British Library," describing the only known keyboard manuscript of 20 pieces in Purcell's own hand, and the recording of the entire manuscript of Purcell's keyboard works on three period instruments by harpsichordist Davitt Moroney, The Diapason, June 1995, 6.

                  3.              See also The Purcell Companion, edited by Michael Burden (Amadeus Press, 1995), reviewed by Enrique Alberto Arias in The Diapason, November 1995, 8-9. The book contains 11 essays in five sections: Introduction, Background, A Composer for Church and Chamber, Purcell and the Theatre, and Purcell in Performance.

                  4.              The are some inconsistencies in the end date of chapter 2 and the start date of chapter 3, and between the contents outline and the chapter headings in the text, as well as an inaccuracy in the start date of chapter 5.   

                  5.              The date and location of the first performance of Dido and Aeneas has been a matter of speculation. Recent research supporting the title-date connection is cited in King, 173; the problem is acknowledged but not resolved in Burden's introduction to the contemporary reference (Purcell Remembered, 79); Holman concludes "I suspect, however, that the last word has not been said on the matter" (Henry Purcell, 195).

                  6.              (Richard Goodson, the elder?), Orpheus Britannicus, ii (1702, 1711), cited in Holman, 21.

Henry Purcell, by Robert King. London and New York: Thames and Hudson, 1994. 256 pages, 103 illustrations, 13 in color. $34.95.

Purcell Remembered, by Michael Burden. Portland, OR: Amadeus Press, 1995. xxv + 188 pages, 17 b/w illustrations. $29.95 hardcover plus $5.50 s&h, $17.95 papercover plus $4.50 s&h. Available from the publisher, 133 S.W. Second Ave., Portland, OR 97204-3527.

Henry Purcell, by Peter Holman. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1994. xvii + 250 pages, 42 musical examples. $17.95, paper.

Dr. Charles Burney (1726-1814), one of England's earliest and most notable music historians, wrote: "Unluckily for Purcell! he built his fame with such perishable materials, that his worth and works are daily diminishing, while the reputation of our poets and philosophers is increasing by the constant study and use of their productions. And so much is our great musician's celebrity already consigned to tradition, that it will soon be as difficult to find his songs, or, at least to hear them, as those of his predecessors, Orpheus and Amphion. . . ." Burney attributed the disregard of the work of this superior genius, "equal to that of the greatest masters on the continent," to the changeability of taste in music and to "an inferior band to the Italian opera composers, as well as inferior singers, and an inferior audience, to write for."1 Fortunately for Western musical culture, these impediments to the appreciation of Purcell's music no longer exist.

The level of awareness of Purcell's music in recent years has been increased by the discovery of new manuscripts,2 recordings, progress towards the completion of the comprehensive edition of his works, the publication of books, exhibitions, and other special media events connected with the 1995 tercentenary year. The number and diversity of Purcell's creative output--anthems, domestic sacred music, services, catches, odes, secular vocal music, theater works, keyboard works, consort music--present a challenge to complete comprehension.

In recognition of the tercentenary year, eight books have been published between 1994 and 1996; seven of these will be discussed in these pages in two installments.3 The books in the first group, general in outlook, present the historical background of Purcell's time, provide a picture of his life from scattered sources, and establish a credible context for his compositional genres; those in the second group, more closely focussed and which include two edited collections of essays, deal with specific aspects of the development of Purcell's musical style and performance practices, then and now. All of these works contribute much to deepening our appreciation of this 17th-century master from these diverse viewpoints, ranging from the social and musical setting in which he worked to the opinions of critics and musicians across the centuries.

Robert King is one of Britain's leading baroque conductors. While at Cambridge University he founded The King's Consort, a period-instrument orchestra. He has made over 50 recordings; about one-half of these feature the music of Purcell, for which he researched and prepared his own performing editions. His current project is the recording of all of Purcell's odes, welcome songs, secular solo songs, and sacred music. His historically oriented book, Henry Purcell, provides a fitting introduction to this group of tercentenary publications.

The brief Prologue of the book touches upon several themes identified in other books: Purcell's acknowledged genius; the diversity of his compositions for the church, the opera house, the theater, small domestic instrumental forces, and his royal patrons. It also comments on the lack of information about Purcell himself, who left few letters and no personal diaries. Our present picture of Purcell, therefore, is a composite sketch compiled from scanty references in official records set against the wider historical background, which King treats in considerable detail throughout five chapters, each dealing with a politically defined chronological period.

Chapter 1, "A Restoration Childhood, 1659-1668," covers the period from the dissolution of Cromwell's Protectorate parliament to the "Triple Alliance," the diplomatic triumph of King Charles II. In this period Henry Purcell senior was appointed Master of the Choristers at Westminster Abbey, where he worked with his counterpart at the Chapel Royal on the choral and instrumental music for the royal coronation. Also, Thomas Purcell, young Henry's uncle, received an appointment as composer at the royal court. The catastrophic plague of 1665--the cause of the death of Henry's father in 1664 might have been due to an earlier isolated outbreak--and the great fire of London in 1666 undoubtedly left lasting impressions on the young Purcell. Whether "the wistfulness that is so prevalent in Purcell's music could therefore be seen as a manifestation of a little boy still crying for his lost father" (p. 42) is perhaps an excessive psycho-biographical speculation, however.

Chapter 2, "Learning the Trade, 1668-1677,"4 reconstructs the musical scene at the Chapel Royal from the time when young Henry became a chorister there at the age of eight or nine to the death of the eminent musician Matthew Locke, court composer and also a friend of Henry's father and uncle. As a chorister, the young Purcell's musical education included lessons from John Blow and Christopher Gibbons, son of Orlando. Although the Chapel boys were encouraged to compose, no composition by Purcell has survived. Along with other boys, he might have acted in London theatrical performances--a formative experience for his later influential years in that context. When his treble singing days were over, Purcell became assistant-apprentice to the supervisor of the royal instruments ("regals, organs, virginals, flutes and recorders and all other kind of wind instruments whatsoever"), a position that ensured contact with court musicians. Whether or not Purcell ever was a pupil of Matthew Locke, the latter's influence on the youth must have been great, partly through the composer's association with the Purcell family, but more directly through the court performances of Locke's music, whose style is reflected in the ode Purcell composed on the death of Locke.

Chapter 3, "Rising Star: Purcell at the Court of Charles II, 1677-1685," chronicles the period from the time when the teenage Purcell was appointed court composer, succeeding Locke, to the death of the royal patron. Commencing with this chapter, the author's discussions of Purcell's compositions include comments on their editions, scoring, musical textures, harmonic language, structural devices, expressive features, and general aesthetic characteristics, all of which provide condensed program notes for the works described. Purcell's compositions in this period included church anthems, the first small-scale songs to go into print, odes and welcome songs for royal occasions, verse anthems, and various instrumental pieces, including the Sonnata's of III Parts, published in 1683. His first commissioned work for the celebration of St. Cecilia's Day appeared in the same year. Only a year before, Purcell had received an appointment as one of the three organists of the Chapel Royal, and a year later he assumed the position of full supervisor and keeper of the royal instruments, following the death of his mentor. The infamous "battle of the organs," an acrimonious contest in 1684 between the builders Bernard Smith and Renatus Harris over the contract for a new organ for the Temple Church was resolved in Smith's favor, after much hostility and a mischievous act of sabotage; the players on Smith's instrument at the trials were Purcell and Blow.

Chapter 4, "Changing Fortunes: Purcell and King James, 1685-1688," covers the short period from the coronation of King James II, for which Purcell set up an organ in Westminster Abbey and contributed a grand, large-scale anthem, to the King's flight from England following political upheavals. During this uncertain time Purcell maintained his position as one of the three organists in the Chapel Royal, but the position of official court composer went to Blow; accordingly, Purcell turned his attention from writing anthems to developing the devotional song--his solo vocal writing at its best--and to his first royal ode. As Purcell wrote less music for the church and more secular vocal music, his compositions began to appear increasingly in printed editions. Even so, his financial affairs suffered on account of the King's decision to open a new Roman Catholic chapel at Whitehall, staffed by highly paid musicians imported from abroad. Purcell was among the royal employees who had to battle for payment for their services, but eventually he was paid "for repairing ye Organs and furnishing Harpsichords."

Chapter 5, "Maturity Cut Short: Purcell under William and Mary, 1688 [sic]-1695," opens at a critical point in English constitutional history, the declaration in 1689 of William and Mary as king and queen. Purcell had control of the organ loft for their coronation, and he produced the first of six birthday odes for the new queen in the same year. Although royal patronage in music was diminishing, Purcell maintained a busy schedule at court (still as supervisor of the royal instruments) and the Chapel Royal, in addition to his responsibilities at Westminster Abbey. The production in 1689 at a girl's boarding school of an opera, presumed to have been Dido and Aeneas,5 marked the beginning of his career as the leading composer for the London theater. The sources, production, and musical features of his various works for the genre are supplied in appropriate detail throughout this chapter. About a month after the annual celebrations of St. Cecilia's Day in November 1694, Queen Mary died in the smallpox epidemic that was sweeping London; Purcell composed a march and some vocal music for her funeral service in Westminster Abbey, and later, the music for two elegies. Purcell's own premature death at the age of 36, attributed to tuberculosis, was also marked by a ceremony in Westminster Abbey, when some of the music he had composed for Queen Mary's funeral was again played. A brief Epilogue to the book mentions various persons who paid tribute to England's greatest musical figure and to some significant 20th-century performances of his work.

This elegantly produced and thoroughly researched book successfully interweaves highlights of social and political events with the state of music in late 17th-century England. The numerous graphic illustrations of persons, places, and important events of the period that accompany the text, including a double-page, full-color painting of London in flames, bring a sense of immediacy that transcends the verbal accounts. For these reasons this book provides a stimulating introduction to the study of Purcell for the general reader. A useful supplement is a performer's catalogue of Purcell's works intended to aid performers and scholars as a general reference or for concert programming; pieces in the various genres contain information on titles, authors, occasions, composition dates, first performance dates, soloists, choruses, instruments, timing, and Zimmerman classification numbers. A selected discography and a selected reading list of 48 titles, chiefly historical (only six directly on Purcell), complete the volume.

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Michael Burden is Lecturer in Music at New College, Oxford, and directs the New Chamber Opera. He has written widely on 17th- and 18th-century music and 20th-century musical theater. His book, Purcell Remembered, is a unique assembly of selections from various official publications, notices, public documents, letters, diaries, reminiscences, prefaces and dedications to Purcell's published works, and other sources relating to the composer and his times, spanning three centuries. Much of the material derived from these scattered sources is tangential to Purcell's music as such, but taken as a whole it provides an engrossing and instructive account of life in Purcell's day, and therefore it is a useful supplement to Robert King's historical narrative.

An introductory chronology of Purcell's life and works mentions other musical, political, social, and cultural events, some of which may have impressed Purcell. The selections are presented within discrete sections focussing on Purcell's early life and the Chapel Royal, singers and singing, his Sonnata's of III Parts and a battle for an organ, two coronations and a revolution, publishing and pedagogy, the stage, Purcell's death, the Restoration musical scene, recollections and assessments of Purcell's works by commentators, and similar opinions by musicians through the years.

The selections cover Purcell's life span and beyond. For example, several excerpts from the diaries of Samuel Pepys, England's observant and music-loving writer who wrote during the period 1660-1669, include a reference to a meeting in 1660 with Henry Purcell's father or uncle and the composer Matthew Locke, followed by an account of the activities at the Chapel Royal and vivid descriptions of the plague of 1665 and the Great Fire of 1666. Pepys also remarked on Purcell's first composition, a song included in a collection published in 1667. As for Purcell's death in 1695, his will is reproduced, along with a description of his interment in Westminster Abbey, some letters by his wife Frances and the publisher Henry Playford relating to the posthumous printing of some sonatas, and several odes, including Dryden's praiseful lament for "The God-like Man, Alas! too soon retir'd." The nature of Purcell the man remains obscure, apart from passing references to his "mirth and good humour, which seem to have been habitual to him"; his contemporaries and successors confined their descriptions to his musical abilities as a composer. His adult singing abilities were extolled in 1685 as "wondrous skill" in an adoring ode by Aphra Behn, the first professional writer in England. As an accomplished organist, Purcell often adjudicated the appointments of other organists and advised on the building or maintenance of church organs. Relevant passages are reproduced from church vestry minutes and from the writings of the music critic Roger North (1653-1734) concerning the great battle for the organs between the rival builders Renatus Harris and Bernard Smith, in which Purcell and Blow successfully demonstrated the Smith organ, and Giovanni Battista Draghi played the Harris instrument.

References to Purcell's small-scale vocal works highlight two contrasting subgenres; the high-minded and the down-to-earth. One example of the former was the performance of Purcell's ode for the St. Cecilia's Day celebrations in 1692; his songs, on the other hand, some of the ribald variety with their bawdy allusions, provided communal entertainment in public taverns, alehouses, and coffeehouses. An explanation of the musical structure of catches and glees, and instructions for singing them, appeared in an advertisement to John Playford's 1673 edition and later editions, along with some examples. One entertaining rebus referred to the composer:

His surname begins with the grace of a cat,

And concludes with the house of a hermit, note that;

His skill at performance each auditor wins, But the poet deserves a good kick on the shins.

Glimpses into significant historical events of Purcell's time are provided in eyewitness descriptions of the coronation of King James II in Westminster Abbey in 1685, when Purcell was organist there, and of the joint coronation of King William and Queen Mary in 1689, when Purcell attended to his usual duties at the Abbey, including the provision of a second organ. The last days and funeral rites for Queen Mary, for which Purcell contributed some of the music, are chronicled in several documents relating to the event.

Public awareness of Purcell in his own time and after his death was due in large part to the publishers John and Henry Playford, father and son, who brought out the composer's works. Their artful prefaces and self-effacing dedications--short on content, strong on flattery for royalty and the anticipated subscribers among the public--sometimes featured encomiastic verses on the collections or offered biblical justification for the learning of music. On the other hand, Purcell's opening remarks to his Choice Lessons for the Harpsichord or Spinet, published in 1696, were pedagogical in nature, consisting of directions to the performer and "Rules for Graces," a table of ornaments and embellishments. Almost a century later, Charles Burney speculated that Purcell adopted this practice to meet the needs of ignorant and clumsy performers, and that it contributed to the obsolescence of his music.

Today's readers may vicariously visit the productions of some of Purcell's theatrical works over the centuries through the descriptions by witnesses to actual performances, beginning with an account of Dido and Aeneas (?) in 1689; George Bernard Shaw's quirky review of a 1889 production of the same work provides contrast, as do the critical commentaries on later revivals by Gustav Holst and Thomas Beecham. Appropriate selections from advertisements, prologues, reviews, and recollections relating to performances of Dioclesian, King Arthur, and The Fairy Queen are included here, along with several assessments of the state of opera in England through the years. A summing-up by Sir George Dyson in 1932 acknowledged the freshness and beauty of Purcell's music for his stage productions, but attributed their lack of consistent plots and unified design to the entertainment-driven desires of the public.

The assessments of Purcell by musicians, historians, journalists, and other writers over the years consisted mainly of flattering tributes; insightful critical evaluations did not appear until recent times. For example, an unsigned contribution to the Universal Journal in 1734 described Purcell as "a Shakespear in Musick," possessed of "a most happy enterprizing Genius, join'd with a boundless Invention, and noble Design [who] made Musick answer its Ends (i.e.) move the Passions"; William Boyce, writing in 1768, praised him as "a Genius superior to any of his Predecessors . . . . equally excellent in every thing he attempted." Nevertheless, in 1893 C. Hubert H. Parry, while admitting that Purcell was the greatest genius of his age, criticized his excesses in realistic expression and his faulty judgment in matters of choral style that involved occasional lapses into innocent bathos and childishness. Peter Warlock, writing in 1927 about Purcell's fantasias, found their advanced perfection of form and content sufficient to include them in England's most significant contributions to the world's great music. A wide-ranging and perceptive review of Purcell's place in English music, written by Donald Francis Tovey in 1941, opined that Purcell was born either 50 years too soon (to gain access to the resources of Bach and Handel) or 50 years too late (to be master of the Golden Age). Sir Jack Westrup, formerly chairman of the Purcell Society for almost 20 years, writing in 1959, deplored the repetition of the limited amount of Purcell's music performed in inappropriate "realizations" from erroneous copies. Quotations by contemporary British composers Benjamin Britten, Michael Tippett, and Peter Maxwell Davies reveal their attraction to Purcell that initiated performances of his works--Davies deplores note-perfect but emotionally insensitive "authentic" performances--that contributed to the renewal of interest in the master in England and elsewhere.

Michael Burden's three-century harvest of written fragments about Purcell and his times provides in words the same sense of immediacy that Roger King's illustrated historical narrative does in pictures. Purcell Remembered includes a center section of 17 small monochrome illustrations, some of which duplicate the more opulent chromatic pictures in King's volume. A multidimensional understanding of the Purcell could therefore be achieved by reading both volumes in parallel.

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Peter Holman is now Senior Associate Lecturer at Colchester Institute of Music, following a teaching career at the Royal Academy of Music, London, and elsewhere. In addition to writing for scholarly journals, he maintains an active performing career as a harpsichordist, organist, and director of The Parley of Instruments and musical director of Opera Restor'd. His book, Henry Purcell, provides the context for understanding the various genres within which Purcell worked: his small-scale domestic works, both vocal and instrumental, and his large-scale public works in church music, the odes, and theater music.

An opening chapter on Purcell's musical world covers the salient events of his life span: the re-establishment of musical life in the Restoration period, the role of secular musicians and performing groups, Purcell's service as a choir boy at the Chapel Royal and his early musical instruction, his duties as a music copyist, his first post as custodian and repairman of musical instruments, his activities as court composer, his succession to the position of organist at Westminster Abbey, the decline of royal patronage of music, the political accommodations of musicians, and life in the theater. Again, we are reminded that little is known about Purcell the man from direct evidence, but attempts have been made to draw character implications from the handwriting of the person described in a later poetic reference as one whose "Pride was the sole aversion of his Eye, Himself as Humble as his Art was High."6

Nearly all Restoration songs dealt with some aspect of love (usually from the male viewpoint), and Purcell's contributions to the genre--dance songs, declamatory songs, and dialogues--have always been greatly admired. The humble catch, too, was mostly preoccupied with wine and women, although Purcell provided untrained amateurs and off-duty musicians with settings of various topics: politics, loyal toasts, newsworthy events, bell-ringing, and others. The Italian influence in England was felt in both performance practice and repertory, and several ground-bass songs by Italian composers were models for Purcell and his contemporaries. Holman gives some detailed consideration to Purcell's musical language in the songs, such as the affective associations of certain keys, the colors obtained through different keys in unequal temperament, and other melodic and harmonic devices relating words, music, and emotion. Other forms treated in the same chapter include symphony songs (inappropriately called "cantatas") performed in the royal apartments, verse anthems and theater songs, some of which became models for succeeding generations of song writers.

Genre distinctions prevail in the discussion of instrumental music, such as fantasias and pavans in the contrapuntal tradition, and overtures and chaconnes as orchestral forms. Holman draws comparisons with earlier forms by Purcell's predecessors and similar works by his contemporaries, and speculates on Purcell's intentions for them as composition exercises or performance pieces. At the same time, notwithstanding the admiration of English musicians for Italianate sonatas, the relationship between Purcell's sonatas and those by Italian masters remains unresolved, as does the rationale for their sequential order in collections. As for Purcell's keyboard music, recent discoveries of Purcell manuscripts have helped to resolve some questions of Purcell as author or arranger of harpsichord works. Several organ voluntaries are now known to have been falsely attributed to him, and many others undoubtedly never were written down, due their improvisational nature.

Insofar as the tradition of cathedral music was unfamiliar to the generation that had lived through the period of the proscription of singing in church services and the destruction or dismantling of organs, Purcell and his contemporaries had much to do to rescue earlier practices and develop new repertory. Holman's discussion of church music follows Purcell's development from his youthful preoccupation with contrapuntal forms to his later absorption of the melodic, harmonic, and structural features of the Italian style. As a writer of anthems, however, Purcell perhaps owed less to Italian music than to Matthew Locke, whose compositions provided the model for works that synthesized formal counterpoint with expressive, soloistic, vocal writing and daring harmonies, but without Locke's polychoral style. The distinguishing features of Purcell's symphony anthems are discussed in some detail, including the Italian harmonic influences and sense of drama. Some useful background information accompanies the account of Purcell's last church music written for Queen Mary's funeral and performed again at Purcell's own funeral.

Apart from Purcell's three famous odes, Welcome to All the Pleasures; Hail, Bright Cecilia; and Come, Ye Sons of Art, Away, the remainder have been neglected partly on account of the toadying texts of these celebratory or welcoming compositions; besides, little is known about their origins or the circumstances of their performance. Purcell's experimentation in this genre involved contrapuntal and ground-bass writing, along with new ways--including the sophisticated Italian influences--of combining voices and instruments. The superb writing style, controlled structure, and grand scale of the ode on St. Cecilia's Day, Purcell's most popular choral work, inspired Handel to produce a birthday ode; this marked the beginning of the English secular choral tradition, according to Holman.

The reopening of the London theaters around 1660 and the presence of instrumental groups to accompany the plays also offered creative opportunities to Purcell. His first music for the theater was performed in the early 1680s, but he dropped out of the scene for almost a decade for reasons unknown. Equally obscure are the inspiration, circumstances, dating, première, foreign musical influences, and political and allegorical meanings of Dido and Aeneas. The resumption of Purcell's career in the commercial theater in 1690 was marked by the production of more than 40 works in the remaining five years of his life, including the landmark Dioclesian, the first semi-opera, followed by King Arthur and The Fairy Queen of the same genre. Holman's discussion of these and other later stage works touches upon the integration of music and action, in addition to other more purely musical issues.

The discussion of each facet of Purcell's output contains assessments of both its glories and shortcomings, with respectful consideration of unresolved and controversial issues surrounding dating, style, and other historical circumstances. The reader's assimilation of this material, however, could have been aided by a system of subheadings to identify the subtle shifts in focus and subject imbedded in the seamless flow of information within each section. Moreover, the book lacks a concluding chapter that would provide a general assessment of Purcell's accomplishments within his own time and his influence on future generations. Nevertheless, the author's enthusiasm for Purcell's music and his comprehensive treatment of its distinct genres undoubtedly will contribute to the renewal of both scholarly and practical interest in the composer and his music far beyond the heightened exposure both received during the tercentenary year. A bibliography of 204 books, articles, and general reference works; a list of 108 edited music collections; and an index of Purcell's works by genre provide the necessary documentation.      

Henry Purcell: The Origin and Development of His Musical Style, by Martin Adams. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995. xiii + 388 pages. $59.95.

Purcell Studies, edited by Curtis Price. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995. xii + 305 pages. $64.95.

The Purcell Companion, edited by Michael Burden. Portland, OR: Amadeus Press, 1995. xiii + 504 pages, 16 b/w illustrations. $39.95 hardcover plus $6.50 s&h, $19.95 papercover plus $4.50 s&h. Available from the publisher, 133 S.W. Second Ave., Portland, OR 97204-3527.

Performing the Music of Henry Purcell, edited by Michael Burden. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996. xvii + 302 pages. $85.00.

The books under review here comprise a second group of works published in recognition of the 300th anniversary of the death of Henry Purcell in 1695. Those in the first group--Henry Purcell by Robert King, Purcell Remembered by Michael Burden, Henry Purcell by Peter Holman--that were reviewed in the November issue of this journal (pp. 15-17), are general in outlook: they present the historical background of Purcell's time, provide a picture of his life from scattered sources, and establish a credible context for his compositional genres. The books now to be discussed, which include three collections of essays, are more closely focussed: they deal with specific aspects of the development of Purcell's musical style and performance practices, then and now. All of these works contribute much to deepening our appreciation of this 17th-century master from these diverse viewpoints, ranging from the social and musical setting in which he worked to the opinions of critics and musicians across the centuries.

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Martin Adams is at Trinity College, Dublin; his first book, Henry Purcell, The Origin and Development of His Musical Style, is a comprehensive exploration and analysis of Purcell's musical style. Unlike Peter Holman's study, which often discusses the same compositional genres within the broader context of Purcell's musical world, Martin Adams deals more closely with the influences of other composers, both within England and abroad, on Purcell's compositional development, particularly in the newly emerging ode and English opera. His declared intention is to demonstrate that, in spite of surface changes in Purcell's style during his lifetime, "he was a deeply conservative composer who had to struggle to reconcile the tide of the times--which he helped so strongly on its way, and which he identified primarily with Italian music--with the compositional priorities of his early music" (p. ix). In spite of the complex web of both native and foreign influences surrounding Purcell, Adams aims to identify those distinctively Purcellian musical traits common to the composer's output in diverse genres.

The evidence for these claims is presented in two separate but interdependent sections. Part One, "Stylistic development and influences," covers Purcell's lifespan in five chapters: his early years at court and home around 1680; the years of experiment between 1680 and 1685; the three-year period of progress, synthesis, and consolidation from 1685; the time of public recognition between 1689 and 1691; and the concluding period from 1692 to 1695, when Purcell was at the height of his compositional powers and public reputation. Part Two, "Analytical and generic studies," retraces Purcell's compositional life in greater depth and selectivity in ten chronologically ordered chapters dealing with the main genres: instrumental music, sacred music, independent songs, odes, and dramatic music. Considerable attention is devoted to identifying specific English and continental stylistic influences. Throughout the book, Adams notes Purcell's struggles to retain certain traditional stylistic elements while attempting to expand their expressive possibilities into new forms. Even so, he remarks on facets of Purcell's inherent conservatism, "not in the sense of being old-fashioned, but in that he seems to have been dissatisfied by modern developments which abandoned that polyphonic and motivic rigour characteristic of those earlier styles which interested him" (p. 14). 

The primary influences on the eighteen-year-old Purcell, as a precocious composer at the Chapel Royal, were the compositional models of his contemporaries, particularly John Blow and Matthew Locke; his later songs and odes exhibited indebtedness to Blow, and some of his instrumental pieces to his mentor, Locke. In Purcell's early experimental years, his vocal works evidenced the development of techniques suitable to the English language and the amalgamation of complex polyphony with modern structural methods; in later years he exceeded any of his predecessors in the development of musico-dramatic contexts in his operas.

As for continental influences, although Purcell may have encountered North European sonata manuscripts, and a number of Germanic composers were active in London in the 1690s, there is little indication of any direct dependency on German sources. Purcell's adoption of French models, on the other hand, is more evident in his songs, in his treatment of the instrumental chaconne, and in the stylistic features of other more elaborate works, such as Dido and Aeneas, King Arthur, The Fairy Queen, and Dioclesian. In spite of the prevalence of French practices, the more innovative Italian style appealed both to Locke and Purcell.

The extent and significance of Purcell's fondness for Italianate style can be appreciated by the fact that Adams refers to this matter in about one quarter of the pages of his book. In the introduction to the 1683 Sonnata's of III Parts: Two Violins and Bass: To the Organ or Harpsichord, a highlight of his experimental period, Purcell wrote that their dominant inspiration was the attempt to achieve "a just imitation of the most fam'd Italian masters." The reference may have been to any number of Italian composers, perhaps including Corelli, but particularly the works of Lelio Colista (1629-1680), whose compositional characteristics Adams compares with Purcell's in search of evidence of the tension between the latter's conservative and modern tendencies. Adams later identifies similar Italianate tendencies both in Purcell's instrumental music and in his vocal music, where specific techniques were adapted to forceful expressive and dramatic ends; they are to be found in such diverse contexts as operatic aspects of Dido and Aeneas, the musical processes of most movements of King Arthur, instrumental sonatas in The Fairy Queen and elsewhere, trumpet-style pieces from Italian sonatas in Dioclesian, choral and orchestral textures of the odes, and in the vocal and instrumental idioms of his music for the drama.

Adams' enthusiasm for Purcell's music is not confined to the master's most well-known works, but covers less-familiar pieces as well. At the same time, his even-handed treatment also notes occasional weaknesses and shortcomings, such as structural lapses, lack of organic unity and connectedness in large-scale processes, overpredictable repetition techniques, unfocussed internal cross-relations, surface flamboyance, and other misjudgments. Nevertheless, Adams makes a convincing case for Purcell's brilliant imagination, resourceful technique, and wide range of expressiveness that have contributed to his unparalleled reputation for mastery of text and music. This book, with its 151 musical examples and select bibliography of 116 references, is an invaluable companion in the search for a deeper understanding of the stylistic and expressive revelations of Purcell's extraordinary musical genius.

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In 1959, a collection of nine essays edited by Imogen Holst was published in recognition of the tercentenary of Purcell's birth; they dealt with some of the practical problems of editing Purcell's works for performance, and three appendices considered the manuscripts, their location, and their authenticity as autographs.1 Purcell Studies, a new collection of twelve specially commissioned essays, edited by Curtis Price, now principal of the Royal Academy of Music, London, is intended to complement the earlier collection. The majority of the essays incorporate recent research on Purcell's compositional techniques through a study of his manuscripts; other more specialized articles explore the relationship between Purcell and John Blow, and examine Purcell's court odes, performance practice, and the anatomy and subsequent revivals of King Arthur.

The articles dealing specifically with manuscript-related topics (Robert Thompson, Robert Shay, Rebecca Herissone, Curtis Price, Peter Holman) are a music historian's delight, with their meticulous consideration of dating and chronology, handwriting, ink color, paper quality and watermarks, and other physical evidence. In general, they attempt to ascertain the practical function of autograph manuscripts in Purcell's working life by reconstructing the compositional evolution of his scorebooks, along with his treatment of literary texts, revision techniques, and changes in musical language from the early to the later works. The discovery in 1993 of an autograph manuscript of Purcell's keyboard music generates speculation about the teaching function of the haphazard remainder of similar pieces, some of which might have been arranged from orchestral sources. Another newly discovered autograph score of an anthem by the temperamental cathedral musician Daniel Roseingrave raises questions as to why Purcell would have copied out, for teaching purposes, this interesting but imperfect work.

There is a topical affinity between one essay dealing specifically with Purcell's relations with John Blow (Bruce Wood), another analyzing Purcell's odes (Ian Spink), and a third connecting Purcell, Blow, and the English court ode (Martin Adams). Although the fact of the long relationship between Purcell and Blow is generally accepted, the essays in this book provide a deeper understanding of common structural links in their respective works, perhaps the closest between Blow's Venus and Adonis and Purcell's Dido and Aeneas. Their mutual interest in Italian music, similar orchestral techniques, and other imitative affinities point to a mutual and friendly rivalry in the interchange of musical ideas, although Purcell was the bolder innovator of the two. The particular consideration of Purcell's odes deals with poetic and literary models, the welcome songs, birthday odes, the St. Cecilia odes, and other miscellaneous odes. Taken together, although they contain much of Purcell's best music, the stilted and bombastic verses of the welcome songs and birthday odes in particular are full of political as well as classical allusions, and they often served as propaganda tools for monarchical legitimacy. It is claimed that the mutual influence between Blow and Purcell emerges most clearly in the court odes, which was a recognized poetic genre in England by the 1660s. The discussion of their respective musical treatments of these text-sensitive and flamboyant entertainments indicates that while Blow's technically imaginative search for new stylistic methods was a stimulus for Purcell, the latter's command of formal and stylistic elements accounted for his lead as a technical innovator by 1683.

Two paired articles deal with the elusive problem of the relation between musical time and expressiveness. The first (A. Margaret Laurie), which considers the matter of continuity and tempo in Purcell's vocal works, deals with the linking of movements through the logical succession of keys, common pulse, and transitional tempos. A possible connection between music and technology is behind the speculation that Purcell's fascination with new developments in clock- and watch-making in the 1670s might explain the introduction of clock timings into performance instructions--perhaps intended only for beginners--of some collections of pieces. Even so, Purcell did offer some explanations of time words, such "quick," "brisk," and "slow," to supplement given time signatures and to clarify his intentions. The complementary essay (Katherine Rohrer) on poetic metre, musical metre, and dance types in Purcell's vocal works seeks to demonstrate that his choice of particular musical metrical frameworks was dictated by poetic stresses in opening lines of the text. Moreover, his choices of rhythmical outlines often relied on contemporary French dance models, and many compositional decisions were highly rule-bound responses to various verse types. Nevertheless, Purcell's genius lay in his ability to transform these conventional forms into highly expressive works uniting text and music.

The two concluding essays on King Arthur deal with the anatomy of this work and its 18th-century adaptions, respectively. The first (Andrew Pinnock) deals with the collaboration between two foremost figures of the time: Dryden the dramatic poet and Purcell the composer. Tantalizing but unresolved questions about the dramatic opera concern the date of the original draft of the 1691 production, ambiguous satirical or allegorical allusions to royalty, subsequent revisions, mismatches between the poets's libretto and Purcell's compositional style, and the authenticity of both the text and the setting of some of the songs. The second article (Ellen T. Harris), after touching on parallels with Shakespeare's Tempest, analyzes several of the opera's later revivals, particularly the one in 1770 by the poet David Garrick and the composer Thomas Arne, a collaboration that was not without tensions regarding both the text and the music, disputes that perhaps reflected changing contemporary taste. Later revivals were marked by compressions, cuts, additions, and other "improvements," all of which fuel the contemporary controversy between coexisting revisionist and authentic viewpoints on the preservation of the original works.

Prelude and postlude: while Curtis Price shares the frustration of other Purcell scholars who have lamented the lack of direct information concerning the personality of the man himself, in an opening introduction he speculates that "a more general appreciation of his music will not arrive until that personality is better fixed in the public imagination" (p. 1). His tentative personality reconstruction of Purcell, derived both from those who knew him and from emerging knowledge about his compositional habits, points to a proud man, confident of his talent, sometimes brooding and irritable, who may have had a certain contempt for the inability of a tune-loving public to fully appreciate the subtleties of his music. The author of a concluding afterword (Janet Snowman) on the origin of a small watercolor portrait of the young Purcell, dating from the 18th century and now in the collection of the Royal Academy of Music, London, wisely avoids drawing any psychological character inferences from the picture, whose exact origin remains unknown.

The twelve essays in this book (including one by its compiler) are arranged in a sequential grouping of topics, proceeding from the general to the specific, that supplies a desirable continuity seldom achieved in edited collections of articles. While there is some overlapping content, this has been allowed to exist in the interest of completeness and internal coherence within the individual pieces. At the same time, the coverage of all of Purcell's major compositional genres adds to this overall survey of recent research on his work, a valuable supplement to the first such collection devised by Imogen Holst almost forty years ago.

*   *   *   *   *

Michael Burden, Lecturer in Music at New College, Oxford, and director of the New Chamber Opera, has written widely on 17th- and 18th-century music and 20th-century musical theater. His compilation of selections from original sources, Purcell Remembered, was discussed in the preceding series of reviews about the composer. The Purcell Companion, a collection of articles by contributors of diverse backgrounds--university lecturers, scholars, music directors, editors, musicologists, radio producers--united in their interest and expertise in Purcell, cover all aspects of his work. The eleven essays are arranged in five divisions that deal with introductory matters, background issues, church and chamber compositions, the theater, and performance practice.

The introductory essay on the Purcell phenomenon (Andrew Pinnock) explains how Purcell acquired his reputation in his own lifetime and how his successors preserved it, particularly through such societies as the Purcell Club (1836), the Musical Antiquarian Society (1840), the Purcell Society (1876, still going strong), the work of biographers, notable performances, the marketing techniques of today's recording industry, and increasingly specialized musicological studies, as well as the tercentenary celebrations of 1959 and 1995.

The first of the three background essays (Jonathan P. Wainwright) deals with Purcell and the English Baroque, and advocates a recognition of the interconnections between the political, religious, and literary trends of the time. The recurrent question of foreign influences on Purcell is summarized in the judgment that Purcell's heterogeneous and versatile musical style is a synthesis of English (Matthew Locke, in particular), French, and Italian elements. A complementary essay (Graham Dixon) on Purcell's Italianate circle does not consider specific musical influences, but notes the publication of Italian music in London, the presence of Italian musicians and composers living in London, visiting Italian singers, and the approval of the literary figure Samuel Pepys, all of which could be taken as indicators of public taste. Even Purcell's reference to the unidentified "fam'd Italian masters" in his introduction to his Sonnata's of III Parts might be understood as a marketing ploy catering to the current vogue for Italian music. The concluding essay (Michael Burden) in the background series looks at Purcell's contemporaries: indigenous English composers of the time from the forgotten (Henry Cooke, William Child, Pelham Humphrey) to the remembered (Matthew Locke, John Blow), along with other minor composers and singers who performed in Purcell's works. There is even some speculation about Purcell's sociable drinking pals, for whom the published texts of the composer's bawdy catches had a certain risqué appeal.

The article on Purcell's music for the church (Eric Van Tassel)--the longest in the book: 99 pages and 26 musical examples--considers the various genres (full anthem, full-verse anthem, verse anthem, symphony anthem, and concerted anthem) and their chronological phases. Taken together, the analysis of these types is an intricate exploration into Purcell's transformation of musical language through the use of dramatic devices, linking of chorus movements, symbolism, word painting, imagery, the shaping of vocal lines, imitation and pictorial gestures, stylistic integration, and other richly expressive techniques through which Purcell transformed commonplace texts into works of artistic imagination unequalled in English church music. In a similar fashion, the reappraisal of Purcell's odes (Bruce Wood) attempts to provide a full picture of Purcell's musical development in this long-neglected genre. The poetic hack-work, feeble doggerel, and general poverty of the literary texts--one was written by a school pupil--have detracted from an appreciation of the musical qualities of the court odes, which include sumptuous orchestral writing, resourceful tonal plans, and assured counterpoint. Yet, Hail! Bright Cecilia! remains the grandest of 17th-century English odes; the less exalted Come Ye Sons of Art Away is no less fine in its musical illumination of ideas in the text. Purcell's creative vitality in the odes perhaps exceeds that in his anthems.      

The assessment of the little-known genre of consort music (Peter Holman) reveals different traditions, problems, and ambiguities, beginning with the term itself. Examples discussed here include overtures, chaconnes, pavans, fantasias, trio sonatas, and ayres, all of which are examined with respect to their scoring, musical language, harmonic style, and formal patterns. Remarks on the early history of these forms are supplemented by accounts of the role of the chamber organ and the introduction of the violin. The lack of success of the sonatas in their day is attributed to their serious contrapuntal nature, intended more for the player than the listener; the breezy, tuneful Ayres for the Theatre, on the other hand, gained popular status as they were reshuffled for later concert use.

The first of two essays on the theater (Edward A. Langhans) reconstructs the social context in which Purcell's music was performed by describing the two public London theaters and the varied audiences that attended the spectacles staged there. Detailed descriptions are given of their architectural features, the placement of musicians, illumination, audience behavior, stage design, scenery, and other elaborate technical mechanisms that contributed to the world of visual make-believe. The account of Purcell's theater music (Roger Savage) covers his career at the playhouse that occupied the last five years of his life, during which he was involved in the production of 40 shows at Drury Lane and Dorset Garden. His ayres and songs served small-scale preluding and interluding functions, while the overtures performed a framing or mood-mirroring function. The description of the interplay of ceremonies, masques, and magic in these musical spectacles, often involving supernatural elements and sacred rites, is supplemented by a close examination of Dido and Aeneas, in which Purcell contributed graphic musical sequences in support of these dramatic aspects. The connections in subject and treatment between this opera and Purcell's other dramatic works are also outlined in some detail.

Purcell in performance is the subject of the two concluding essays. The first (Andrew Parrott) focusses on several critical issues, with reliance on performing materials: keyboard tuning systems and their implication for continuo performance, the harpsichord and the viol as continuo instruments, theorbo-lutes and guitars, orchestras on the French model, expressive vibrato, woodwinds, pitch, and aspects of vocal resources and performance, all of which contribute to a greater understanding of the craftsmanship involved. The second essay (Roger Savage) returns to Dido and Aeneas through a consideration of a variety of production problems that confront present-day conductors, designers, and choreographers, for example: programming the short piece, the appropriate performing edition, the connection with Virgil's Aeneid, visual decor, the chorus, portrayal of the dramatic characters and main events, and unification of visual and musical stylistic elements. It is recommended that the attempt should be to produce a memorable event for contemporary audiences, not copies of an unknowable first performance at a boarding school for girls in 1689.

Like the preceding collection of essays edited by Curtis Price, the unity of Michael Burden's compilation is aided by the topical grouping of the essays. While the general reader will find the exacting level of detailed analysis difficult to assimilate, and even specialists and researchers may not want to attempt a cover-to-cover encounter with this book, the essays will repay repeated consultation in areas of particular interest. The editor's comprehensive bibliography of 284 items is an added scholarly bonus, and 16 black-and-white illustrations provide visual enrichment.

*   *   *   *

Michael Burden's third contribution to the recognition of Purcell's tercentenary is another edited collection, but with a different origin and focus. As he explains in the preface, the fifteen constituent essays originated from a conference on the topic "Performing the Music of Henry Purcell," held in Exeter College, Oxford, in 1993. In this case it was the idea of a collection of essays that produced the conference, not the other way around. Even so, this collection does not represent the complete conference proceedings, for some of the papers presented have been omitted and others have been added. The result is a wide-ranging compilation of articles on diverse subjects, some of which do not focus directly on Purcell's music, but enlighten the reader on relatively obscure but nevertheless fascinating aspects of the social-cultural environment of the composer's time. Among the practical skills of the scholars responsible for these essays are those of violin maker, organ builder, choirmaster, musical director, stage designer, tutor of dramatic art, and stage producer--all of which add an aspect of authoritative, hands-on experience to their academic presentations.

The book is divided into two parts: eight essays on "Performing the Music" and seven on "Staging the Operas." An opening essay (Peter Holman) considers the evidence in existing Oxford manuscripts for reconstructing the conditions of the performance of Restoration music for voices and instruments; although the Oxford ode was a standardized type of composition, the scoring practice appears to have been quite diverse. A discussion of the features of the English organ in Purcell's lifetime (Dominic Gwynn) focuses on sounds and stops (the reception of imitative sounds), layout (location and casing of the main divisions), compass (ranging from 49 to 52 notes), and pitch (low and high, including the preferences of Robert Dallam, Thomas and Renatus Harris, and Bernard Smith). Violin-making in England is the topic of an essay (John Dilworth) that touches on both Italian and English design and construction practices in a time when "English violin making dragged itself from the dark ages to the renaissance during the short lifetime of Purcell" (p. 48).

The essays in the remainder of the first section deal with matters of historical performance. The discussion of Purcell's "Ekotick" trumpet notes (Peter Downey) reveals how the performance of nonharmonic pitches was assisted by the invention of a telescopic slide mechanism. An attempted reconstruction of the first performance of Purcell's music for the funeral of Queen Mary (Bruce Wood) confronts a number of problems relating to the choral music, the march, the drummers and what they played, instrumental textures, and the organization of the burial. An analysis of keyboard ornamentation (H. Diack Johnstone) subjects the influential "Rules for Graces," published in the third (1699) edition of Purcell's keyboard collection, to close analysis. Two complementary essays relating to vocal matters conclude the section on performance: the first, on Purcell's stage singers (Olive Baldwin and Thelma Wilson), yields insights into both the teaching and performance of singing at the time, with detailed references to leading personalities and their activities in the field; the second (Timothy Morris) focusses on voice ranges, voice types, and pitch in Purcell's concerted works, but shuns conclusive pronouncements in the face of inadequate evidence.

The first essay in the second part of the book that deals with staging the operas (Michael Burden) confronts the issue of dramatic integration (or its lack) by documenting varieties of "debauchery" ("corruption, debasement, or contamination of the original work") of past performances that departed from the original texts. The relentless attack examines instrumental arrangements, rearrangements of scenes and scores, extraneous music, costume designs, and various illogical versions; the condemnation extends even to the productions of such major Purcellian protagonists as Charles Villiers Stanford, Gustav Holst, Ralph Vaughan Williams, Constant Lambert, and Benjamin Britten. Next, a departure into the nonmusical world of allegory (Andrew R. Watling) provides a useful background for understanding topical or political allusions found in 17th-century dramatic texts and how audiences of that time might have unlocked their hidden meanings (specific reference is made to Dido and Aeneas). The place of dancing and the types of dance music also receives scholarly attention (Richard Semmens), with particular consideration of the French influence and the linking of music and choreography. The question of what Purcell's operas may actually have looked like is addressed in a discourse on costume and etiquette (Ruth-Eva Ronen) that describes wardrobe fashions of the time and the way people behaved. In the absence of other surviving evidence, the assembled recollections of two of Purcell's contemporaries, the lawyer-critic Roger North and the singer-actress Charlotte Butler, are suggestive of the reception accorded Purcell's stage works (Roger Savage). In particular, a reconstruction of the performance of Purcell's Dioclesian (Julia and Frans Muller) provides technical information about the scenery and staging of the production. The concluding essay (Lionel Sawkins) speculates on the question of a plausible shivering tempo in the music Purcell wrote for the Frost Scene in King Arthur, described by an 18th-century critic as "that exquisite piece called the freezing piece of musick."

Four appendices include a catalogue of surviving original parts of Restoration concerted music at Oxford, a list of 34 English viol- and violin-makers working in London in the second half of the 17th century, a documentary list of Purcell's stage singers, and a list of dances in Purcell's operas. Twenty-eight black-and-white plates relate exclusively to the staging of dramatic productions of the time.

This collection of essays, like the other two anthologies, has its own distinctive qualities: impeccable scholarship on the part of the authors, logical selection and organization by the editor, and much fascinating content for the readers, generalists and specialists alike. While there is little actual duplication of content among the three edited collections, there is enough subtle reinforcement on certain topics to provide a sense of literary déja vu for readers who have both the interest and persistence to explore all of them.

 The concluding remarks of the Introduction to Performing the Music of Henry Purcell provide an fitting conclusion to this series of books, along with a speculation on the future of Purcell studies and performances:

There are many hopeful signs that the Purcell tercentenary will not just have been an exploitation of the things we know best about the composer. . . .

This collection of performance studies represents not a final stage but a continuing process of exploration of Purcell's music and its present-day realization. It would be boring indeed if we ever reached a conclusion about these endlessly fascinating subjects. Every new performance must go on creating a different idea of the music, and Purcell's compositions, with their inexaustible possibilities, will make us rise to the challenge.2

In short, in Shakespeare's phrase, "Whereof what's past is prologue."3      

Purcell manuscript acquired by British Library

The British Library has acquired the only known keyboard manuscript by Henry Purcell, written in his own hand. Not only are there 20 pieces by Purcell, but the collection contains 17 by the Italian harpsichordist and composer, Giovanni Battista Draghi, then in London as Master of the Italian Musick to Charles II, and lastly one piece, a Praeludium, by Orlando Gibbons.

The manuscript was discovered in a purchase of secondhand books by an English book dealer. It immediately attracted attention when shown to various experts and authorities and was given the ultimate stamp of authenticity by Prof. Curtis Price, the Purcell expert at King's College, London. The collection was sent to Sotheby's for sale at auction and was bought by a private dealer. Meanwhile, a campaign to save it for England was launched through the Purcell Tercentenary Trust. The government cooperated by withholding an export license to allow time to raise money equal to the purchase price of £287,000 ($453,000 circa). To this end many foundations, commercial companies and private donors contributed, and at last, the invaluable manuscript was saved for the British Library's already world famous collection.

In November of this year at the British Library there will be an exhibition with the Purcell manuscript as the "star" to commemorate Purcell's death in November 1695.

Meanwhile Davitt Moroney may be heard on a Virgin Veritas compact disc (VC 5 45166 2) in an outstanding reading of the entire Purcell manuscript, played on three period instruments.

--Virginia Pleasants

Features and news items are always welcome for these columns. Send them to Dr. Larry Palmer, Division of Music, Southern Methodist University, Dallas, TX 75275.

Larry Palmer is a contributing editor of THE DIAPASON.

Celebrating the Couperin

Jane Clark and Derek Connon: The mirror of human life: Reflections on François Couperin's Pièces de Clavecin. King's Music, 2002.

School of Politesse: François Couperin Pièces de Clavecin (Ordre 1, pieces 1-6; Ordres 6, 13, 19, and 27 complete, played by Jane Clark, harpsichordist). Janiculum compact disc (JAN D206). Book and recording available in the US ($16.99 each, plus postage) from Rhinebeck Records <rhinebeckrecords@compu serve.com>.

Complete Seventeenth-Century French Unmeasured Preludes, played by Nannette G. Lunde, harpsichordist. Sparrow CD 101 (two compact discs issued in 2002) available from Skyline Publications <www.skylinestudio.com&gt;.

Armand-Louis Couperin: Pièces de Clavecin played by Brigitte Haudebourg. Arcobaleno compact disc AAOC-94352 (issued in 1999) <www.kuysleis.com&gt;.

Indispensable! One word characterizes this new book by Jane Clark and Derek Connon.

The largest part of the paperbound volume (pages 47-109) consists of a catalogue of movements making up the four books of François Couperin's Pièces de clavecin. From ordre to magnificent ordre, Jane Clark shares the most recent discoveries about the composer's often-elusive titles. In her introductory essay "Aspects of the social and cultural background" Clark writes of Couperin's connections to the Bourbon-Condé family, in particular to the music-loving Mlle de Charlolais (later the Duchesse Du Maine), facilitator, at the châteaux of Châtenay and Sceaux, of aristocratic theatrical entertainments, many of which have direct bearing on Couperin's music.

"Aspects of the literary scene" is Derek Connon's compendium concerning the increasingly-conservative French court during Couperin's time, the transvestite Abbé de Choisy, satiric offerings by the imported Italian theatrical troupes and their contrast to the style of the French Theatre, vaudeville, songwriters, the Fair theatres, and the Calotins. Both Clark and Connon note that Couperin had wide-ranging, non-highbrow literary tastes, and a particular interest in uniting Italian and French influences in his music.

In her choice of repertoire for the book's separate-but-complementary compact disc, Jane Clark "attempts to illustrate Couperin's theatrical sense" as it developed through the successive volumes of his Pièces de clavecin. In this traversal she succeeds elegantly, abetted by the properly-French timbres of her Feldberg Whale harpsichord after Jean Goujon.

Nannette G. Lunde's two-disc set comprising all the known 17th-century French unmeasured preludes for harpsichord is also a distinguished addition to the harpsichord discography. Beginning with sixteen "white-note" preludes of Louis Couperin, she continues with the multiple pieces in this style by Nicolas Lebègue, Elisabeth-Claude Jacquet de la Guerre, Jean Henry d'Anglebert, Louis-Nicolas Clérambault, Gaspard Le Roux, and unique examples from the pens of Marchand, Rameau, Siret, and Michel (?) Forqueray. Twenty-nine anonymous preludes from widely-dispersed manuscripts complete this comprehensive project.

Lunde plays with style, conviction, and, above all, musicality in this often problem-plagued repertoire. Her solutions for organizing the improvisatory works are sensible, her artistry subtle, and the sounds from her 1988 Willard Martin harpsichord (after a Blanchet instrument of 1720), appropriate. Tuning in 1/4-comma meantone temperament and her choice of a low "French opera" pitch (A=392) allow these works to sound both pungent and dark-hued.

A suggestion to listeners: approach these discs as you would a large selection of appetizers from a gourmet menu! Too many at one time could lead to aural distress. The preludes were intended to preface dance movements or to test tunings. Use them as introductions to other, more rhythmically-structured works; savor the preludes one or two at a time, thus avoiding an oversdose.

Harpsichordist Brigitte Haudebourg achieved a first prize at the Paris Conservatoire in 1963 (studying with Marcelle Delacour and Robert Veyron-Lacroix). Since then she has pursued a successful career as soloist, continues as artistic director of an international summer festival of baroque art and music in Tarentaise, and has recorded at least fifty compact discs! She gives annual master classes at American universities in Laramie and Houston.

Haudebourg's playing of the (nearly) complete harpsichord works of Armand-Louis Couperin gives much pleasure. (The only solo works omitted from this disc are four pieces comprising "Les Nations"—a somewhat tongue-in-cheek glorification of French music in which the composer saved the best representation for his own country, following less-flattering musical evocations of the English, Italians, and Germans.)

Gems in this collection include the virtuosic Les Cacqueteuses (fowl humor), l'Arlequine (a piece that stands up well in comparison to the work of the same name by Armand-Louis' predecessor François), and the wrenching l'Affligée (with its particularly poignant harmonies in the pathetic key of B-flat minor).

An "edition" by Haudebourg of these pieces for the French publisher Zurfluh consists of the original 1751 publication in facsimile, with slightly more than a page of commentary (in French) containing biographical information plus a few sentences about some of the people referred to in the titles. This same information, complete with English translation, may be found in the notes to the compact disc.

The harpsichord music of Armand-Louis Couperin presents a particularly felicitous choice for playing from facsimile, since most of the pieces utilize the familiar treble and bass clefs of present-day usage. Only three works detour into the alto (C) clef for a few measures (Allemande, Arlequine, and Affligée). For many years I have played from a facsimile issued in Basel, Switzerland by Mark Meadow (under the imprint Musica Musica). Like the readily available and clear facsimile edition published by Broude Brothers Limited in their Performers' Facsimile series (PF41; $17.50), Meadow based his reprint on an original in the Library of Congress, uniquely identifiable by the Couperin signature scrawled at the lower right of the first page of La Victoire, the opening piece in the volume.

To learn more about Mme Victoire, to whom A-L Couperin dedicated his Pièces de clavecin, consult the indispensable book by Clark and Connon! Thus we come full circle in this celebration of France's major musical dynasty.

Send news items or comments about Harpsichord News to Dr. Larry Palmer, Division of Music, Southern Methodist University, Dallas, TX 75275        ([email protected]).

John Collins has been playing and researching early keyboard music for over 35 years, with special interests in the English, Italian, and Iberian repertoires. He has contributed many articles and reviews to several American and European journals, including The Diapason, and has been organist at St. George’s, Worthing, West Sussex, England for over 26 years.

In 2014 there are several composers whose anniversaries can be commemorated, albeit some of the dates are not known for certain. Some of the names need no introduction but there are also several lesser-known names listed here whose compositions are well worth exploring. No claim is made for completeness, and there is no guarantee that every edition is in print—there may well also be editions by other publishers.  

Giaches Brumel (ca. 1510–64).French composer who worked at the court in Ferrara from 1532. Ascribed to Brumel are two ricercars (one imitative and one chordal) and a Missa de la Dominica in the manuscripts at Castell Arquato, edited by Knud Jeppesen for Norsk Musikforlag, Oslo, in Die italienische Orgelmusik am Anfang des Cinquecento and more recently, albeit in halved note values, by H. Colin Slim for American Institute of Musicology Corpus of Early Keyboard Music 37, volume 3, which contains a wider selection from the manuscripts. It has been postulated that 14 of the set of 17 ricercars known as the Bourdeney Codex may also be by Brumel. These lengthy contrapuntal works have been edited by Anthony Newcomb for A–R Editions (R89).

Francisco de Peraza (1564–98).Organist in Seville, he left a Medio Registro alto de 1 Tono, the earliest known surviving example of this genre, which became popular in the Iberian repertoire. This has appeared in several anthologies, including American Institute of Musicology’s Corpus of Early Keyboard Music 14: Spanish Organ Music after Antonio de Cabezon, edited by Willi Apel. 

Gregor Aichinger (1564–1628).Organist in Augsburg to the Fuggers, six ricercars and four motet intabulations have been edited by Eberhard Kraus in Cantantibus organis, vol. 7, for Verlag Friedrich Pustet. A further motet intabulation is included in Altbaierische Orgelmusik, vol. 1, edited by Eberhard Kraus for Noetzel. 

Giovanni de Macque (ca. 1550–1614). Born in Flanders, he came to Naples ca. 1585, becoming head of the vice-regal chapel in 1599. He was the teacher of Ascanio Mayone and Giovanni Maria Trabaci, both of whom published two volumes of highly influential pieces. De Macque published copious amounts of madrigals but no keyboard works; however, almost 40 pieces survive in manuscripts. These include eight canzonas, four capriccios, two stravaganzes, a consonanze stravaganti, a durezze e ligature, an intrata, a toccata a modo di Trombetta and a set of variations on Ruggiero, which have been edited by Liuwe Tamminga (vol. 1), and 14 ricercars (the first book of 12 published ricercars set for keyboard together with a further two thought to be from the second book), edited by Armando Carideo (vol. 2); both volumes are published by Il Levante (available through La Stanza della Musica). The first set of 12 ricercars has also been edited by Christopher Stembridge for Zanibon. This edition includes a comprehensive discussion of the modes and their affects, along with the registration prescribed by Diruta. The ricercars are the first to present the different subjects at the beginning of the piece. The durezze and stravaganze are highly chromatic compositions. The older edition by Watelet and Piscaer for Monumenta Musica Belgae also contains Partite sopra Zefiro de Rinaldo attributed by the editor to de Macque; this, however, is almost certainly a set of partite on Zefiro composed by Rinaldo dell’Arpa. 

Hans Leo Hassler (1564–1612). Primarily known today for his vocal music, he studied organ in Venice with Andrea Gabrieli and became a leading player in Augsburg. He left a substantial corpus of keyboard works of considerable scope and length, most of it preserved in the Turin manuscripts, including eight toccatas, 18 ricercari, 18 canzone, fourteen Magnificats, an organ Mass, four fugues, and two sets of variations. Problems of attribution have occurred with pieces variously ascribed to Sweelinck, Christian Erbach, and Giovanni Gabrieli. A good selection, as well as the variations on Ich ging einmal spazieren, was edited by Georges Kiss for Schott and Sons. The toccatas were edited by S. Stribos for the American Institute of Musicology, and the Magnificats by A. Carpene for Il Levante Libreria. A few other pieces from other manuscript sources have been included in various anthologies, including 25 of the 39 intabulated songs from his Lustgarten of 1601, edited by M. Böcker for Breitkopf & Härtel. The complete works from the Turin manuscripts are available in two volumes, edited by W. Thein and U. Wethmüller for Breitkopf & Härtel. A further volume containing the complete remaining keyboard works from other sources has been in preparation for some time. These supersede the edition of a small selection of pieces by Hassler and Erbach, edited by Ernst von Werra ca. 1903 for Denkmäler der Tonkunst in Bayern, second series, vol. IV, no. 2. 

Franz Tunder (1614–67). Organist of the Marienkirche, Lübeck, he left about 17 compositions in manuscripts, including five praeludia exemplifying early use of the Stylus Phantasticus and a canzona, along with 11 chorale settings, of which six are fantasias. Auf meinen lieben Gott is set for two manuals without pedal, Jesus Christus, wahr Gottes Sohn is for single manual and pedals, and Jesus Christus, unser Heiland has three separate variations, of which the first includes much use of double pedal. Two further chorale settings in the Pelpin manuscripts originally attributed to Scheidemann have now been tentatively attributed to Tunder. All pieces have been edited by Klaus Beckmann for Breitkopf & Härtel.  

Benjamin Rogers (1614–98). Organist at Eton and Oxford, he left sacred and secular vocal music, consort music, and 17 keyboard works of which the great majority are dances better suited to stringed keyboard instruments. Two, however, are voluntaries and are more suited to performance on the organ. All pieces have been edited by Richard Rastall for Stainer & Bell. 

Charles Racquet (1597–1664). Organist in Paris, he left 12 versets de psaume en duo, which was printed in Mersenne’s Harmonie universelle, Paris, 1636–37, and a large–scale Fantasie in manuscript. All have been edited along with works by De Bourges, N. de la Grotte, and D. Gaultier by Jean Bonfils in L’Organiste Liturgique, xxix–xxx for Schola Cantorum et de la Procure générale de musique.

Georg Leyding (1664–1710). He had lessons with Buxtehude and became organist in Brunswick. Although Walther mentions his many keyboard pieces, only five organ compositions have survived in manuscripts, including three praeludia with demanding pedal parts (C, B-flat and E-flat), a set of variations on Von Gott will ich nicht lassen and a prelude on Wie schön leucht uns der Morgenstern. These have been edited by Klaus Beckmann for Breitkopf & Härtel.

Johann Speth (1664–1720). Organist in Augsburg, he published Ars Magna Consoni et Dissoni… in 1693, which contains ten toccatas, Magnificats on the eight tones that include a praeambulum, five verses, and a finale (some verses are actually by Poglietti, Kerll, and Froberger), and three sets of partitas for manuals only, each with six variations. Although the preface states that these pieces are all playable on the clavichord, the toccatas and Magnificats contain an obbligato pedal part, although this is either octave doubling or long held notes. All were edited (alas, without the original preface) by Traugott Fedke for Bärenreiter and there is a facsimile published by Early Music in Facsimile, Edition Helbling, Innsbruck, with a preface by Rupert Frieberger.  

Pablo Nassarre (1664–1724). Blind from infancy, he was organist in Zaragoza, and is best known today for his theoretical works, Fragmentos músicos and Escuela música, según la práctica moderna, which are available in facsimile. He also left five organ pieces, including three tocatas [sic] edited by José Llorens for Diputación Provincial de Barcelona and a tiento partido and two versos from a manuscript in Astorga, edited by José Alvarez in Colección de obras de órgano de organistas españoles del siglo XVII for Union Musical Española. 

Pierre Dandrieu (1664–1733). Organist and priest in Paris, he left a book of 36 noëls with variations, similar in style to those in Lebègue’s third book, and five other pieces including a carillon. Pierre’s book appeared in several editions from 1714 up to 1759, and 37 pieces were reworked by his nephew Jean-François for a publication that also included 11 of the latter’s noëls. Edited by Roger Hugon for La Sociéte Française de Musicologie and published by Heugel. A facsimile edition of the prints of 1729/59 has been published by Fuzeau.

Guillaume Gabriel Nivers (1632–1714). Organist of St. Sulpice, Paris, his Livre d’orgue contenant cent pieces de tous les tons de l’église of 1665 is the earliest known of such volumes presenting a group of pieces by tone (12 in this case, the first two having 10 verses, the rest eight), with highly individual and specific registrations. There is a comprehensive explanation of the tempi, registration, and ornament signs. He published two further volumes: 2e livre d’orgue contenant la messe et les hymnes de l’église in 1667, which contains a Mass and 25 hymn settings, and 3e livre d’orgue des huit tons de l’église in 1675. He also published some vocal and much liturgical music. The first two Livres d’orgue have been edited by Norbert Dufourcq for Editions Bornemann and the third Livre by him for Heugel. All three Livres are available in facsimile from Fuzeau. The third Livre is also published by Societé Française de Musicologie (EZ.SFM20). 

Franz Matthias Techelmann (ca. 1649–1714). Two sets of pieces (in A minor and C major) comprising Toccata, Canzona, Ricercar, Allemande, Courante, Sarabande, and Gigue (or Minuet in C major set) survive in an autograph manuscript, of which the non-dance elements work well on the organ. Between the ricercar and the dances in the A minor set there is an aria (with 30 variations). The non-dance movements in A minor have been edited by Laura Cerutti for Edizione Carrara, and a complete edition by Herwig Knaus for Denkmäler Tonkunst Osterreich vol. 115 also includes 13 dance suites, which may be by Techelmann or possibly Kerll. 

Diego Xarava (1652–ca. 1714). Nephew of Pablo Bruna and organist of the Capilla Real, Madrid, he left two pieces in the extensive Martin y Coll Manuscript 1357: an Ydea Buena y fuga por a la mi re (the fuga occurs separately in the Jaca manuscript), and an Obra en lleno de 3 Tono. These have been edited by Carlo Stella and Vittorio Vinay for Zanibon, available through Armelin, and by Julián Sagasta in vol. 2 of Tonos de Palacio y Canciones Comunes for Union Musical Española.  

Carl Philipp Emmanuel Bach (1714–88). Fifth child and second surviving son of Johann Sebastian, he is well known today for his many sonatas, fantasias, rondos, and miscellaneous pieces for stringed keyboard instruments, as well as his important treatise on playing keyboard instruments (Versuch über die wahre Art…). He left only a few pieces specifically for organ, including a set of six sonatas for Princess Amalie, edited by Peter Hauschild and Gerhard Weinberger and a Prelude in D, six fugues, a trio, two chorale preludes, and five chorale arrangements edited by Jochen Reutter and Gerhard Weinberger, both volumes published by Wiener Urtext. The edition of the organ works as part of the complete C. P. E. Bach edition has been edited by Annette Richards and David Yearsley as volume 1/9 for Packard Humanities Institute (this volume omits the sonata Wq 70/1). Four further fugues have been edited by Wilhelm Poot for Interlude Music Productions. 

Gottfried Homilius (1714–85) studied with J. S. Bach and became organist in Dresden in 1742. In addition to Passions, a cantata cycle, Magnificat settings and motets, he left 41 chorale preludes, of which 38 have been edited by Christoph Albrecht and published by Breitkopf & Härtel, and five organ pieces from a privately owned manuscript in Dresden have been edited by Christoph Albrecht and published by Leutkirch: Pro Organo. Thirty-eight chorale preludes for organ and melody instrument have been edited by Ellen Exner and Uwe Wolf for Carus Verlag. 

Johann Anton Kobrich (1714–91).  Organist in Landsberg, in addition to vocal music he left several sets of Parthien better suited to stringed keyboard instruments, although the two sets of Der clavierspielende Schäfer are described as “Welche sowohl in der Kirche als auch zu Hause können producirt and gebraucht werden.” Of his organ collections unfortunately most, including 20 toccatas, six sonatas, and pieces suitable for Offertory, Elevation, and Communion, remain unpublished in modern editions. Selected pieces from these sets have been edited by A. Maisch and published by Albert J. Kunzelmann. Figuralische Choral–Zierde, his collection of preludes and versets in the eight church tones was edited by Rudolph Walter for Alfred Coppenrath, Alttötting and is now available from Carus Verlag. Several pastorales that were appended to the first set of Der clavierspielende Schäfer have been edited by Gerhard Weinberger and published by Anton Böhm & Sohn.

Johann Mattheson (1681–1764). Better known today for his numerous theoretical works, he left a small collection of keyboard works, mainly for stringed keyboard instruments, but Die wolhklingende Fingersprache (containing 12 fugues, some with dances) of 1735 and 1737 is also suited to the organ. Edited by Lothar Hoffman-Erbrecht for Breitkopf & Härtel. 

John Reading (ca. 1685–1764). Organist at Lincoln and various London churches and an influential teacher, he compiled several volumes of keyboard music for organ and harpsichord, in addition to vocal music, of which three containing organ pieces (voluntaries and psalm settings) are preserved at Dulwich College, one at Tokyo, and one at Manchester. They are unique sources for many pieces, including his own compositions. A comprehensive selection of the Dulwich volumes has been edited by Robin Langley as volume 3 of the ten-volume series of English organ music for Novello; it includes early versions of voluntaries by Stanley. 

Johann Xavier Nauss (ca. 1690–1764). Organist in Augsburg, he published several volumes of keyboard music, of which the two parts of Die spielende Muse—consisting of preludes, verses, finale, aria (1st to 6th tones) or pastorella (7th and 8th tones) and fugue on the 8 tones, plus a set in E major—have been edited in one volume by Rudolph Waters for Alfred Coppenrath, Alttötting, which is now available from Carus Verlag. 

Wilhelm Hieronymus Pachelbel (1686–1764). Son of Johann, and organist in Nuremberg, he left two Praeludia und Fugen, a toccata, and two chorale settings, which have been edited by Hans Möseler and Traugott Fedke for Bärenreiter. 

Charles Burney (1726–1814). Also better known today for his numerous writings on music including The Present State of Music in France and Italy, The Present State of Music in Germany, the Netherlands and the United Provinces, and his monumental General History of Music in four volumes, which just beat the similar publication by Sir John Hawkins. He also wrote articles for Rees’s Cyclopaedia. Burney left some vocal music, a set of concerti, and several sets of sonatas for harpsichord solo and duet, along with chamber pieces, and a set of VI Cornet Pieces and a Fugue (1751), which comprises an Introduction in E minor followed by six Cornet movements and concludes with a fugue in the still-rare key of F minor. Around 1787, Burney published Preludes, Interludes and Fugues Book I, which includes pieces in keys from A to C; no trace of the second book survives, if indeed it was ever printed. These two publications have been edited by David Patrick and published by Fitzjohn Music. 

Abbé Georg Vogler (1749–1814). Widely traveled with the electoral court, organ designer and teacher, he left theater productions, symphonies, and concerti, and several collections of organ music, which remain largely unpublished in modern editions. 112 Petites preludes pour l’orgue ou le clavecin, op. 16, has been edited by Joachim Dorfmüller for Rob Forberg. A collection of 32 preludes has been edited by Armin Kircher for Carus Verlag, and, together with his Pièces de clavecin of 1798, by Floyd Grave for A–R Editions (C24).

Nicolò Moretti (1764–1821) left some 29 organ works; 17 (including 13 sonatas, a pastorale, two rondos, and an adagio) have been edited by A. Aroma, the others (including four sonatas, a sinfonia, Elevazione, versets, concertino, rondo, marcia, pastorale, and polacca) by Aroma, S. Carmelos and G. Simionato. Both volumes were published by Paideia Brescia for Bärenreiter, and are now available from Armelin.

Matthew Camidge (1764–1844). After time as a chorister at the Chapel Royal under Nares, he returned to York, where he became organist of the Minster. He published mainly church music, a set of instructions for the pianoforte or harpsichord, and left a set of six multi-movement (including a fugue) concertos for the organ or pianoforte in (ca.) 1815, in which he endeavored to imitate the styles of Handel and Corelli. Edited by Greg Lewin and published by Greg Lewin Music. 

An increasing number of pieces, ranging from complete original publications/manuscripts (which present the usual problems of multiple clefs as well as original printer’s errors) to selected individual works, are to be found on various free download sites, most noticeably IMSLP; however, the accuracy of some modern typesettings is highly questionable, and all should be treated with caution before use. Publishers’ websites include: 

Schott Music: www.schott-music.com&nbsp;

Breitkopf & Hartel: www.breitkopf.com

Bärenreiter: www.baerenreiter.com&nbsp;

Armelin: www.armelin.it

Carus Verlag: www.carus-verlag.com&nbsp;

Butz Verlag: www.butz-verlag.de&nbsp;

Edizioni Carrara: www.edizionicarrara.it

American Institute of Musicology—Corpus of Early Keyboard Music series: www.corpusmusicae.com/cekm.htm&nbsp;

Fitzjohn Music: www.impulse-music.co.uk/fitzjohnmusic.htm&nbsp;

Wiener Urtext: www.wiener–urtext.com  

Denkmäler Tonkunst Osterreich: 

www.dtoe.at

C.P.E. Bach complete works (Packard): www.cpebach.org&nbsp;

Interlude Publications: www.interlude.nl&nbsp;

A–R Editions: www.areditions.com&nbsp;

Editions Bornemann: 

www.alphonseleduc.com&nbsp;

Fuzeau: www.editions-classique.com&nbsp;  

Société française de musicology: 

www.sfmusicologie.fr&nbsp;

Verlag Friedrich Pustet: 

www.verlag-pustet.de&nbsp;

Greg Lewin Music: www.greglewin.co.uk

Heinrichshofen Verlag and Noetzel: www.heinrichshofen.de  

Norsk Musikforlag: 

www.norskmusikforlag.no  

Stainer & Bell: www.stainer.co.uk&nbsp;

Schola Cantorum: 

www.schola-editions.com

Helbling Verlag: 

www.helbling-verlag.de&nbsp;

Larry Palmer is harpsichord editor of THE DIAPASON.

Facsimiles from Fuzeau: Sources for Lifelong Learning

Alternately fascinating and frustrating, facsimiles of original manuscripts and printed editions have become increasingly available. For the harpsichordist there is little that is more rewarding than playing from an actual musical “picture” as presented by the composer. Reading from the “original” certainly does not answer all questions, but it does give an unadulterated source as basis for making one’s own musical decisions. For this reason, I heartily recommend playing from facsimiles as a challenging, and often a cleansing, exercise in musical growth.

To utilize these recent scores from publisher Jean-Marc Fuzeau of France, it will help to have an adventurous spirit, as well as a willingness to learn the occasional unfamiliar clef, frequently used in earlier music manuscripts to avoid excessive employment of ledger lines.

Alessandro Poglietti: Rossignolo  [Collection Dominantes Number 5905].

Works for harpsichord or organ by the Italian composer who died in 1683 during his flight from Vienna following the Turkish siege of that city. Three main sources for these pieces are introduced by Peter Waldner, whose notes in French, English, and German include both biographical and bibliographical information and a listing of available modern editions. Fuzeau’s publication comprises three slim paperbound volumes in a folder: an autograph manuscript from the Austrian National Library, Vienna (Cod. 19248), an early edition from the Music Library of the Benedictine Monastery of Marienberg, Burgeis (60/q 366), and another copy of an old source, now housed in the Deutsche Staatsbibliothek, Berlin (Mus.ms. 17670). All utilize the soprano clef (notes written a third higher than the customary G clef) and the familiar bass clef on F. Individual pieces include a Toccata, Canzone, Allemande Amour, Courante, Sarban, Gigue, Ayre, as well as Il Rossignolo Capricio [sic] and a Petitte Ayre gay “in imitation of the Nightingale.”

Johann Kuhnau: Neue Clavier-übung, Partie I (1689) [Collection Dominantes Number 5716], consists of seven short keyboard suites in C, D, E, F, G, A, and B-flat, prefaced by eleven pages of introductory material by Philippe Lescat. Each group of pieces begins with a Prelude (the fourth suite, a Sonatina). The volume is engraved in a large, clear format employing the first line soprano clef and the familiar bass clef on F.

For a modern performing edition of these works (and others, including the popular and appealing Biblical Sonatas) by Bach’s immediate predecessor as Cantor of Leipzig’s  Thomaskirche, consult the beautifully-presented two-volume set of Kuhnau’s Collected Works for Keyboard edited by C. David Harris, available from The Broude Trust, New York (ISBN 0-8540-7660-4).

Christoph Graupner: Monatliche Clavir Früchte (1722) [Collection Dominantes Number 5855].

Not surprisingly, this collection of “Monthly Keyboard Fruits” comprises twelve groups of keyboard pieces illustrating the months of the year. (I suppose one could create a larger work--Seasons--by playing these suites in groups of three!) Graupner, student of and assistant to Kuhnau in Leipzig, spent most of his distinguished career in Darmstadt. Soprano and bass F clefs, notes by Oswald Bill.

Louis Marchand: Pièces de clavecin (Book I, 1699; Book II, 1702), Air (La Venitienne) [La Musique Française Classique Number 5761].

Book One contains a Suite in D minor, consisting of a (measured) prelude and eight dance movements (including an elegant Chaconne with four couplets) engraved primarily in soprano and third line F clefs (with occasional deviations to G and third line C clefs). Book Two contains a Suite in G minor, the prelude of which has some unmeasured passages. Seven short dance movements follow.

Edited by Thurston Dart, Marchand’s two suites were published by Editions L’Oiseau Lyre in 1960. Dart’s edition does not contain the short Air (printed by Ballard as the character piece “La Venitienne” [in Pièces Choisies pour le clavecin]), included in the facsimile (with easy-to-read G and F clefs). Introductory notes to Fuzeau’s publication include an essay on “French Harpsichord Makers of Marchand’s Time” by Philippe Lescat. An amusing attribution in his Bibliography replaces American harpsichord maker and instrument historian FRANK Hubbard’s first name with the more Gallic spelling FRANCK.

Christian Gottlob Neefe: Zwölf Klavier-Sonaten (1773) [Collection Dominantes Number 5880].

Twelve early classic works for clavichord by Beethoven’s teacher; published in Leipzig with a dedication to “Herr Kapellmeister [C P E] Bach in Hamburg.” The original print featured a clear, clean text (soprano, bass F clefs). The inevitable printer’s errors are noted and corrected in introductory material by Pascal Duc.

Number Twelve in the Fuzeau series Méthodes & Traités  fills two volumes, each containing more than 200 pages. Clavecin presents in chronological order selections from the most important French sources concerning the harpsichord. A reading knowledge of French would be helpful, but for those who are challenged by the language, a great amount of enjoyment may be gleaned from the generous offering of harpsichord-related images, easily-deciferable information, and the many musical examples.

Beginning with tuning and building information from Mersenne’s Harmonie universelle (1636) and Denis’ Traité de l’accord de l’espinette (1650), volume one continues with ornament tables found in the keyboard volumes by Chambonnières (1670), d’Anglebert (1689), Dieupart (1701: a volume dedicated to the Countess of Sandwich), Le Roux (1705), François Couperin (Book I, 1713), Dandrieu (1724), Dagincourt (1733), Michel Corrette (1734), Louis-Claude Daquin (1735), Rameau (1736), Van Helmont (1737), Jollage (1738), and Royer (1746), plus complete facsimiles of Saint-Lambert’s Les Principes du Clavecin, (1702) and Couperin’s L’art de toucher le clavecin (1717). [Consult the original layout of Couperin’s Troisième Prélude (page 175) to substantiate a correct reading of the never-corrected faulty first bass note at the beginning of the last score: the guide (guidon) from the preceding line shows it to be a “C,”  but the engraver actually notated a “B-flat,” creating a chord unidiomatic to an 18th-century piece.]

Also included are two documents including important information for stylistic performance of French keyboard music: a letter by Le Gallois concerning the playing of the prélude non mésurée (1680) and Rameau’s two-page commentary on proper touch at the harpsichord (1724), ending with his intriguing comment that the same techniques are applicable as well to the organ.

Volume Two continues this rich treasure trove with Michel Corrette’s Les Amusemens du Parnasse, a short and easy method for the harpsichord (1749). This includes a simple Suite in C for beginners, with fingerings provided AND utilizing the familiar G and F clefs, followed by an additional twelve pages of easy pieces. At the end of the volume Marpurg’s Art de toucher le clavecin (1797) gives a fin de siècle example of keyboard instruction, concluding with another lengthy set of easier pieces by Mr. Sorge, organist and mathematician of Lobenstein (once again using “modern” clefs).

Other gems reprinted in this second volume include composer Duphly’s handwritten remarks on fingering (1769) as preserved in the copy of his Pièces de clavecin, Book I, belonging to his student, English Lord Fitzwilliam; illustrations of harpsichord construction from Diderot’s Encyclopédie (1751- 1772); Lessons and Principles of Harmony by Bemetzrieder (1771) reproduced from a copy once owned by the important 19th-century musical reformer Choron; and several more enchanting engravings of variously styled harpsichords with other instruments from the Essai sur la musique ancienne et moderne by Laborde (1780).

For more complete details, including current prices, consult the publisher’s website: <classical-music.fuzeau.com>. A recent promotional offering, a miniature volume of selected pages from facsimile publications, is offered at this address. Let your discoveries begin!

Send news items or comments about Harpsichord News to Dr. Larry Palmer, Division of Music, Southern Methodist University, Dallas, TX 75275;

<[email protected]>.