Organa Europae 2020 calendar

Dominick Argento, 91, died February 20. Born October 27, 1927, he grew up in York, Pennsylvania. After high school graduation, he was drafted into the United States Army and served as a cryptographer. Following World War II, he entered the Peabody Conservatory, Baltimore, Maryland, to study piano, but switched to composition, earning a bachelor’s degree in 1951 and a master’s degree in 1953. He would eventually earn a doctoral degree from Eastman School of Music, Rochester, New York. The recipient of Fulbright and Guggenheim fellowships, Argento studied in Italy with Luigi Dallapiccola.

In 1958, he and his wife, Carolyn Bailey, moved to Minneapolis, where he began teaching composition and theory at the University of Minnesota. He soon began receiving numerous commissions, particularly for opera. Among his organ works was Prelude for Easter Dawning.

In the 1970s, Argento began composing choral works, particularly for the choir of Plymouth Congregational Church of Minneapolis. He would be the recipient of commissions for choral music by Plymouth Church, the Cathedral of St. Mark, Minneapolis, the Buffalo Schola Cantorum, Harvard and Yale glee clubs, and other organizations. After retirement from the University of Minnesota in 1997, he was named professor emeritus, and continued to live in Minneapolis.

David Gifford, 97, of Northampton, Massachusetts, died January 26. He was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on October 16, 1921, and spent his childhood in Bedford and Cambridge. He attended the Longy School of Music, Cambridge, where he studied organ with E. Power Biggs. After serving in World War II as a Military Police Escort Guide, United States Army, Gifford attended Harvard University where he earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in music.

In 1949 he married Irene Davidson, and they moved to the Oberlin, Ohio, where he studied at Oberlin Conservatory of Music, earning a Master of Music degree. After graduation, the Giffords returned to Massachusetts and settled in Hingham. He became organist and music director at the Old Ship Church, Hingham, and worked as a pipe maker and voicer at Aeolian-Skinner Organ Company, Boston.

He eventually studied for an education degree at Lesley College and taught at Walter F. Dearborn School, Cambridge, and at the Gifford School, founded by his mother, Margaret Gifford, in Weston, Massachusetts. Upon leaving teaching, he returned to organbuilding and became a pipe maker and reed voicer for C. B. Fisk, Inc., Gloucester, Massachusetts, and served as organist at Newburyport Presbyterian Church. After retirement, the Giffords moved to Charlemont, Massachusetts, and David Gifford became organist for St. John’s Episcopal Church in Ashfield, Massachusetts. After his wife’s death in 1999, he moved to Cummington, Massachusetts, and was organist at the Village Congregational Church. Eventually Gifford retired from active organ playing and moved to Williamsburg and then to Northampton, Massachusetts.

David Gifford is survived by his son Ralph Gifford and wife Amy of Westwood, New Jersey, and daughter Anne Dodge and husband Edward of Barkhamsted, Connecticut. A memorial service was held February 16 at St. John’s Episcopal Church, Ashfield. Memorial contributions may be made to The Gifford School, 177 Boston Post Rd., Weston, MA 02493.

Robert “Robbie” Anthony Giroir, Jr., 59, of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, died December 23, 2018, after a brief illness. He earned a Bachelor of Music degree in music education from Louisiana State University and in 1985 became organist and director of music at St. Joseph Catholic Cathedral, Baton Rouge, as well as director of choral studies at Baton Rouge Magnet High School.

During Giroir’s tenure, the choirs at the school consistently earned superior ratings at district and state choral assessments. In the last 15 years, choirs under his direction performed in England, Italy, Spain, Ireland, Czech Republic, Austria, Germany, Belgium, Netherlands, France, and Vatican City. He was named “Music Teacher of the Year” by the Baton Rouge Symphony League for 2010–2011. As director of music and organist at St. Joseph Cathedral, he oversaw the acquisition of the Reuter organ in 1993 as part of the parish’s bicentennial.

His funeral Mass was celebrated at St. Joseph Cathedral on December 27 and was televised live throughout the Diocese of Baton Rouge. His best friend and protégé, Ryan Hebert of the University of Tampa, accompanied the funeral. Members of the Baton Rouge Symphony Orchestra provided a chamber ensemble. The choirs of the cathedral and Baton Rouge Magnet High School sang, assisted by alumni of both groups, comprising more than 130 choristers in all.

Robert Anthony Giroir, Jr., is survived by his mother, Myrtis Leblanc Giroir; sister and brother-in-law, Danette and Ronald Legendre; and nephews with their wives and children, Ladd, Abby, and Landon Legendre, and Brant, Brittney, and Harper Jane Legendre.

Noel Rawsthorne, 89, died January 28. Born December 24, 1929, he studied with Harold Dawber at Royal Manchester College of Music (now Royal Northern College of Music), after which he studied with Fernando Germani in Italy and Marcel Dupré in France.

Rawsthorne was organist of Liverpool Cathedral, UK, from 1955 until 1980, when he was named organist emeritus. From 1980 until 1984 he was also organist of St. George’s Hall, Liverpool. As a recitalist, he performed throughout the UK, Europe, and the former Soviet Republic. In 1994, the University of Liverpool awarded him an honorary doctorate of music. A memorial service was held March 3 at the cathedral of Liverpool.

Sally Gordon-Mark

Born in New York City, Sally Gordon-Mark has French and American citizenships, lives in Europe, and is an independent writer, researcher, and translator. She is also a musician—her professional life began in Hollywood as the soprano of a teenage girl group, The Murmaids, whose hit record, Popsicles & Icicles, is still played on air and sold on CDs. Eventually she worked for Warner Bros. Records, Francis Coppola, and finally Lucasfilm Ltd., in charge of public relations and promotions, before a life-changing move to Paris in 1987. There Sally played harpsichord for the first time, thanks to American concert artist Jory Vinikour, her friend and first teacher. He recommended she study with Huguette Dreyfus, which she had the good fortune to do during the last three years before Huguette retired from the superieur regional conservatory of Rueil-Malmaison, remaining a devoted friend until Huguette passed away.

During Sally’s residence in France, she organized a dozen Baroque concerts for the historical city of Saint-Germain-en-Laye, worked as a researcher for books published by several authors and Yale University, and being trilingual, served as a translator of early music CD booklets for musicians and Warner Classic Records. She also taught piano privately and at the British School of Paris on a regular basis. In September 2020, she settled in Perugia, Italy. In March 2023, Sally was the guest editor of the British Harpsichord Society’s e-magazine Sounding Board, No. 19, devoted entirely to the memory of Huguette Dreyfus. You can download the magazine here:  https://www.harpsichord.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/SB19.pdf.

Editor’s note: Part 1 of this series appeared in the March 2023 issue of The Diapason, pages 18–20; part 2 appeared in the April 2023 issue, pages 14–19; part 3 appeared in the July 2023 issue, pages 10–15.

She was life itself in her way of being and in her playing.²

Most of our colleagues—and we agree—consider Huguette Dreyfus the best harpsichordist of our time since Wanda Landowska. Why? . . . She is above all an artist, a musician who plays for pleasure. It is the way she has of expressing herself—with precision, ease, elegance, variety, and spontaneity. . . . She has a very great attribute: inasmuch as she takes what she does very seriously, she never seems to take herself too seriously.³

This press review was written in 1967, only five years after Huguette had given her first solo recital in Paris. Later that year, another critic referred to her as “the great lady of French harpsichordists, as she is called.”⁴ In that relatively short period, her concerts and recordings had catapulted her to the top of her profession in France.

Huguette’s life could have turned out quite differently. She and her family, being Jewish, lived in France’s “free zone” during the occupation by the Nazis until 1942. When it became necessary to leave, they crossed the Swiss border in December, most likely having traversed the mountains on foot as so many others did. The trip was made in glacial temperatures, for that winter would turn out to be one of France’s coldest in the twentieth century.⁵ She had just turned fourteen when she and her family sought shelter in Switzerland with relatives.⁶ After the war, they settled in Paris.

In 1953 Huguette was granted a scholarship at the Accademia Chigiana in Siena to study with Ruggero Gerlin, who would be her only harpsichord maître, for a total of six summers. In September of that year, Huguette played in the annual end-of-term concert in the Sala Bianca of the Palazzo Chigi-Saracini, which housed the Accademia. A critic was in the audience and spoke briefly of her performance in an Italian newspaper, using words like “grand perfection,” “great agility,” and “always brilliant.”⁷ There was another positive review the following year, when she performed again in the palace. However, she tumbled from her cozy nest in Siena when she participated in the Geneva international competition in October 1958.⁸ The only contestant remaining by the second round, she gave a public concert on October 1,⁹ receiving her first tepid review:

The young French harpsichordist has a very polished technique and animates her playing with an agreeable rhythmic cadence. Yes, all very proper—controlled and musical. Yet given the very impersonal character of the harpsichord, it should be forced to shake things up in a certain manner to be convincing. Yet Miss Dreyfus treats her instrument with very great respect.¹⁰

The reporter criticized her frequent registration changes as being distracting for the audience; Huguette had made five in each movement of the Bach partita, for example. For the third round, Huguette gave a concert in Geneva’s Victoria Hall on October 3, for which she received another lukewarm review, describing her playing as “prosaic.” However, Huguette took the criticism to heart and less than four years later, she received reviews like the following regarding her first solo recital in Paris:

Truly Miss Dreyfus is attached to her instrument, which she plays with exquisite art according to her nature, which is uncommon. What’s more, she captures, with her acute intelligence, the articulation of the phrases. . . .¹¹

This young harpsichordist has a way of playing that is very captivating! A balanced playing, precise, vigorous, as musical as you would wish for! . . . . Huguette Dreyfus knows the resources of her instrument. She exploits it wisely with rare talent, serving musical expression and formal clarity. Thus, the name of Huguette Dreyfus merits being remembered.¹²

In 1964 when the distinguished English musicologist Lionel Salter reviewed one of her Rameau LPs recorded in April 1960 and released in 1963, he praised her choice of registrations:

Huguette Dreyfus gives a whole string of admirable performances, never putting a finger wrong, with an unhurried sense of style and with every ornament convincing and clean as a whistle: her playing has vitality and strong rhythmic control, without ever becoming inflexible, and above all she has excellent taste. Her phrasing is musical, her touch varied, and her registration, while subtly varied, is an object lesson to harpsichordists with fidgety feet or who are afraid to let the music speak for itself. She uses 16-foot tone extremely sparingly, and then in entirely appropriate places.¹³

Never again would “prosaic” be used to describe her! Reviewing a concert she gave in Rome, an American newspaper there reported:

The vitality of Mlle. Dreyfus’s playing was, fortunately, equal to all tests, and she kept her audience in the palm of her hand to the very end. . . . Mlle. Dreyfus’s timing is as keen as that of a trapeze artist, and the arch of her phrase can be as breathtaking as his line of flight. Consequently she has no need of gaudy, tricky registrations. . . . Playing of this caliber is very rare.¹⁴

By the mid-1970s Huguette was on an equal par with the best musicians in Europe and was spoken of as “undoubtedly the greatest French harpsichordist”¹⁵ of her generation. It is evident from a review in 1976 that her personality was clearly integrated into her artistic persona:

. . . Huguette Dreyfus, always great. This musician is a model of sincerity and enthusiasm. She would not know how to be opaque and vague . . . .¹⁶

Parisian harpsichord-maker Reinhard von Nagel remembers:

Huguette on stage: certain harpsichordists have to win the heart of their public during a recital. Not Huguette! The few dancing and buoyant steps she took from coming offstage to the harpsichord on stage gained the audience’s attachment even before she touched the first note. And this even in the dark. In the summer of 1974, a concert was scheduled in Faro. The Portuguese dictatorship had ended several weeks earlier. Well, the night of the concert, an electrical black-out deprived the city of light. Never mind. Huguette played the sonatas by Seixas by heart, in the dark.¹⁷

A critic also spoke of the warmth she communicated to her audience:

Marvelous Huguette. When she sits at the keyboard, you feel her presence and availability immediately. . . . Huguette Dreyfus is warm and at ease from the beginning, which quickly puts the audience on her side. In action, she becomes totally a part of the instrument and a certain “aura” surrounds her, you feel her being a musician from her head—a pretty profile—to the tips of her fingers. Her style? Voluptuous, like her silhouette.¹⁸

For a lady of large renown, Huguette was small of stature, attractive and (bon vivant that she was) voluptuous in youth, plump in later years. She was immaculately groomed and stylishly dressed, often wearing clothes tailored for her. Although highly intelligent and cultured, there was nothing arrogant in her manner: she was confident, yet modest. Meeting her, the first thing that drew you to her was her luminous smile and the cheerful warmth in her eyes. Huguette inspired trust. She was entirely present when you spoke to her—focused, direct, engaged. Her keen wit was accompanied by an infectious laugh, which sometimes burst through her words before she could finish a sentence. She was even subject to uncontrollable giggles on stage, as described here by a British diplomat:

Eduard Melkus gave a most successful Bach evening with his cheery chum Huguette Dreyfus. The papers said how nice to go to an old music concert where the players were obviously enjoying making the music—we had a violin/harpsichord sonata, an unaccompanied violin partita, and two harpsichord concerti—with one instrument to each part instead of a whole orchestra—most enjoyable. The Dreyfus has very nimble fingers and appears to be an infectiously happy person: she soon had us all loving her. . . . Melkus broke a music stand when trying to make it higher: the Dreyfus got a fit of the giggles and the whole audience did.¹⁹

Huguette’s frequent performance partner, harpist Marie-Claire Jamet, recalls her having to leave the stage momentarily during a concert Huguette was giving with Marie-Claire’s husband, flautist Christian Lardé, and baritone Jacques Herbillon. She was on the brink of an uncontrollable fit of laughter, probably due to something Jacques, an impenitent prankster, said or did. Another time, when she and Marie-Claire were traveling by car, they laughed the entire way until they reached their concert venue.²⁰

Matthew Dirst, an American concert artist, teacher, and former student, remembers:

Huguette’s generosity and wicked sense of humor often worked in tandem: I enjoyed many a ride back to Paris in her car after a long day in Rueil-Malmaison, during which she would regale me with stories. Much laughter would ensue, and more than once we had to slow down so she could compose herself before continuing down the road. I also learned more than my fair share of off-color French slang during these commutes, thanks to her lively tutelage.²¹

Huguette loved to travel. It suited someone with her unquenchable curiosity and intense interests. After she acquired a car, she would take a month off to drive through France, Germany, Switzerland, and Italy on her way to Siena for Gerlin’s classes. With her foot on the gas (and she did like to drive fast),²² Huguette would tour the countryside, visit places of interest, see friends along the way. She made detailed notes in her tiny diary of everything from appointments, travel expenses, and phone numbers to recipes and fragments of melodies.²³

A self-proclaimed “chatterbox,” Huguette spoke quickly, her words tumbling out with enthusiasm. Her focus was clearly on her companions and on the outside world. She followed what other musicians were doing, which is why in May 1955 she travelled to the Netherlands just to attend a concert by Janny van Wering. Huguette’s energy seemed to know no bounds. From the beginning of her adult life, she rehearsed, performed, and taught during the day, then saw friends or attended concerts in the evening. If she was ever tired or sad, she did not let it show. As light as her demeanor was, however, it cloaked character traits of a tougher nature. As harpsichordist Jill Severs remembers:

When I first heard Huguette play in class, I was struck by her confidence and competence, and during the following magical years that we spent at the Accademia Chigiana in Ruggero Gerlin’s harpsichord class, it was clear that she possessed a steely ambition. Huguette had a keen wit and was always a kind and helpful friend.²⁴

Friendship occupied a very important place in Huguette’s life.²⁵ No matter how busy, she always maintained correspondence with friends and former students all over the world, often writing letters, postcards, and Christmas cards by hand. She kept up her friendships with classmates from the 1950s, i.e., Kenneth Gilbert, musicologists and radio producers René Stricker and Myriam Soumignac. Other friends included performers with whom she had worked from the early 1960s onwards: Eduard Melkus, Jacques Herbillon, Christian Lardé, Marie-Claire Jamet, Alfred Deller, Luciano Sgrizzi, and Luigi Fernando Tagliavini. Close friends she could see less frequently were Zuzana R˚užiˇcková and her husband, Victor Kalabis. When the Soviets marched into Prague, she offered them a sanctuary, imploring them to come live with her, saying everything she had was theirs, but Zuzana and Victor did not want to abandon their native land. Zuzana never forgot this kindness:²⁶

How could I not remember Huguette, charming, cheerful, and friendly Huguette Dreyfuss [sic], another great artist and friend. How many evenings we spent chatting over a glass of red wine in a cheese place in Paris at the corner of “rue de Londre,” how many competitions as the jury members we have suffered through with the help of mutual support, her wonderful sense of humor, and her generous musicianship. And then came August of 1968: “Come, come together with Viktor, everything will be provided—the apartment, piano, harpsichord.” Perhaps there is nothing to add, this speaks for itself about our Huguette, whom even my students (whom I love to send to her) adore as well as perhaps anybody who has gotten to know her.²⁷

Mstislav Rostropovich, who had moved to Paris in 1978, was another close friend of Huguette’s.²⁸ Sylvia Spycket, a harpsichordist and classmate in Paris and Siena, introduced her to her brother Jérôme and to her sister Agnès, whom Huguette would see frequently.²⁹ Jérôme, a singer in Nadia Boulanger’s ensemble for a time, was a musicologist and the biographer of Clara Haskil, Nadia Boulanger, and Kathleen Ferrier. Agnès was a distinguished author and archaeologist, specializing in the Orient. Sadly, Sylvie, who had also studied with Dufourcq and Gerlin, passed away in her 40s in 1960.

A singular and touching friendship was one that Huguette experienced with a French-Canadian Catholic priest, Abbé Pierre Raymond, whom she had met at a concert in his parish, Saint Boniface, in Manitoba, in February 1963. She was on tour for the first time, playing with the Paul Kuentz orchestra. Abbé Pierre was a cultured, attractive, and articulate man. During the 1960s he was known for his gifts in literature, music, and drama, in the exercise of his role as a teacher and also as an inspector of the schools in his region. He was a fervent supporter of classes being given in French and vigorously campaigned for the survival of the French language in Manitoba. The priest initiated a correspondence with her that would last until 1970.

In the summer of 1964, on a trip to Lourdes, he went to Paris where he had lunch with Huguette and her family in their apartment on the Quai d’Orsay by Pont Alma. Although they were repeatedly invited to visit him in Manitoba to explore the province and stay with his sister Noëlla, who was a nun, teacher, and organist, they never did. In a letter dated August 23, 1965, Abbé Pierre compared the life of an artist with the life of a priest:

I am not unaware that your life as an artist demands the utmost from you. When you have been breathed on by genius and want to make the most of yourself for the happiness of others, it means total dedication, the giving of yourself without half measures and without repentance. Truly a priesthood, neither more nor less. . . . it is music that brings man closest to the ideal, which is cohesion of the hearts of all living beings.

In October that year, he would write to her, the “dear little sister of his soul:”

Take care of yourself, be prudent. But continue to transmit your smile and that of your art. The blessing of the artist has something of that of the great priest! She has a mission to warm the earth by the most profound Love there be!³⁰

In the school year of 1966–1967, Abbé Pierre obtained his master’s degree in theology from the University of Strasbourg. In his letters he expressed his hopes to be transferred to Vienna, but his request would be denied. There are no letters after 1970 in Huguette’s archives, and it seemed at the end that she was trying to discourage their friendship; as he became more and more solicitous about her work pace, she was slower to respond. He would remain thereafter in Manitoba.

In Paris, Huguette and harpsichord maker Claude Mercier-Ythier (1931–2020) sustained a professional relationship for forty-five years that benefited them both. They enjoyed a constant and amical friendship for a total of fifty-four years. Huguette first called on his services in 1962, the year that Claude, a native of Grasse in Provence, opened his store and workshop, A la corde pincée, 20 rue Vernueil, on the west bank of Paris, the first of its kind since the French Revolution. Building, restoring, and renting harpsichords, he also represented the Neupert company when Pleyel stopped making harpsichords. He maintained Huguette’s harpsichord, and since she did not travel with hers, he supplied her with instruments for recordings, concerts, and masterclasses, including an original harpsichord by Henri Hemsch (1754), her favorite, that he had restored.

Being able to play and record on a historic instrument at a time when copies of historic harpsichords were not yet being produced in France was a definite advantage that Huguette had over her rivals. It also helped place her at the forefront of the revival of early music, as did her tendency not to rely on printed editions but to consult original manuscripts at the Bibliothèque nationale in Paris. After Huguette’s death, Claude wrote a tribute to her:

I was proud to have known Huguette. We worked together for 45 years and toured France. How many people discovered the harpsichord thanks to these tours? . . . In certain places, the French were discovering this instrument for the first time. How many beautiful instruments did we discover in fabulous places—castles and convents? And how many unknown artists, composers of past eras, did she bring back to life? She was a woman with an iron will: I saw her give a concert at Saint Paul de Vence with a high fever. She didn’t give in. She had signed a contract, she owed a concert.³¹

The person to whom she was most attached was her brother Pierre, eight years her senior and a surgeon. When he died suddenly of a heart attack at the age of forty-six in 1967, it was a hard blow that took years for her to get over. Later that same year, her mother, aged only sixty-five, passed away. She and her cousin, Nicole Dreyfus, began to see more of each other, eventually becoming very close. When Huguette was eight years old and Nicole twelve, they played piano duets every Sunday. As Huguette described it:

My mother and I went to her house because Nicole had lost her father when she was very young. She was taking piano lessons too. My other great pleasure was playing duets, to improvise completely. . . . Nicole preferred the bass part; me, I was up in the high notes. For us, it was a magnificent pleasure.³²

When Nicole and her mother moved to Nice in 1937, their paths separated. Nicole would become a famous lawyer in France. Once reunited, she and Huguette were often together and took their vacations in exotic places.³³ Nicole accompanied her to the Villecroze summer sessions and was a welcome guest at dinners and parties hosted by Huguette’s friends and students.

Huguette does not appear to have socialized with her first early music teacher, Norbert Dufourcq (1904–1990), but she did stay in touch with him and often attended his organ concerts and seminars. As for Ruggero Gerlin (1899–1983), their relationship remained friendly but formal over the years. He was very reserved, but still, in 1960, the first year since 1953 that she was absent from his class in Siena, he wrote to say that he missed her a lot. They did see each other often in Paris once he resided there.³⁴

The teacher with whom Huguette did develop a close friendship with was Alexis Roland-Manuel, born in 1891. He was very sociable, often inviting his students to his home. When he died on November 1, 1966, his wife asked Huguette to play at his funeral. When her friends passed away, she felt the loss deeply, as was the case with Luciano Sgrizzi (1910–1994), a “walking encyclopedia” according to Claude Mercier-Ythier. It had been an important friendship to her:³⁵

One of the things I appreciated the most in Luciano Sgrizzi was his immense culture. He had an extraordinary knowledge of literature, and you could speak with him on any subject. He always had something to bring to the conversation. I think that when you are a musician, you have to avoid only caring and speaking about your instrument.³⁶

As for Huguette’s preferences in music,

I’ve loved Italian opera since I was young. I’ve always had a special liking for singing—the voices of others, of course. I would have liked to have been able to sing, but that was a gift I wasn’t given.

Huguette especially enjoyed music by Rossini, who she said had the same “visceral joy of living” as Scarlatti did (and as she herself did). She also enjoyed listening to the music of Corelli, Vivaldi, Schubert, and modern music too—“You can’t separate yourself from your own era.”³⁷ She frequently asked her student Maria de Lourdes Cutolo to play Brazilian music for her after class.³⁸ Her favorite composers to play, according to interviews and concert programs, were Jean-Philippe Rameau, François Couperin, and above all, Johann Sebastian Bach and Domenico Scarlatti.

In July 1985 she was featured in a five-part radio program presented by Rémy Stricker on Scarlatti, whom she described as “life itself.” Huguette felt that his sonatas fell into three periods. In the first, he is “extremely virtuoso, very brilliant. The sonatas are very hard to play and full of pitfalls.” The middle period is a transitional period, where he is “more self-assured in his ideas and there are more slow movements,” and in the last, “we observe that Scarlatti has completely mastered his instrument.” She goes on to say:

While hand crossings are rare, there are still many leaps, which are hard to execute. Scarlatti uses the full range of the keyboard. He wants to bring out the instrument’s richness. The last sonatas, more brilliant, show a quality of ideas that the first didn’t have: the virtuosity of the performer tends to disappear before the virtuosity of the composer.³⁹

In another radio interview, Huguette said:

Domenico Scarlatti was a phenomenon in the history of music. As far as I am concerned, he is not comparable to anyone. . . there are explosions in his music—very often of joy. . . . The fact of being dramatic is also important when you have a lot of vitality. You cannot always live joyfully. . . there are melancholy moments that he illustrates magnificently, and above all, very gay and rapid passages become suddenly gloomy, and then he recovers the joy, which is, after all, very dionysiac. . . . Sometimes he plays with equilibrium. He pretends to come back to a form already used, and then goes off another way.⁴⁰

Huguette’s repertoire included not only music from the Baroque and Classical periods, but also twentieth-century pieces by Bartok, de Falla, Stravinsky, Distler, Poulenc, and Dutilleux. Henri Dutilleux (1916–2013) composed a piece in her honor, Les Citations, for oboe, harpsichord, double bass, and percussion—a second part to an existing work (Diptych). In 1991, while teaching at Villecroze Academy in the summer, which harpsichordist Kristian Nyquist attended, Huguette received newly composed pages of the music, a few at a time, from Dutilleux. Kristian observed that she was under pressure to learn it quickly for the premiere, which would take place at the Festival of Besançon on September 9 in the Church of Saint Laurent. Filmed for television and also broadcast on radio, the premiere would be performed by Huguette, Maurice Bourgue, Bernard Balet, and Bernard Cazauran; a recording would follow later.⁴¹ Kristian turned pages for her, enjoying being in the midst of the concert.⁴²

As the curtain came down on the twentieth century, the pace of Huguette’s professional life decelerated somewhat. But her enthusiasm and high spirits did not lessen. She continued to give concerts in France and Europe. In 1994 Huguette resigned from her positions at the principal music conservatories in Lyon and Rueil-Malmaison, but continued to teach at home and in the summer sessions of Villecroze. In 1997 three important CDs that she had recorded came out: Mystery Sonatas, Rosencrantz Sonaten, Sonates du Rosaire (on which Eduard Melkus played violin),⁴³ Le Clavier bien tempéré I,⁴⁴ and Das wohltemperierte Klavier II.⁴⁵

Former students were welcome to come for tea or coffee, cake, and animated conversations on Sunday afternoons; those visiting from other countries found themselves invited to lunch. Huguette continued to travel and attend museum exhibits and concerts. From time to time, she gave concerts and masterclasses, granted interviews, and participated in symposiums. She visited friends in Italy and continued to perform in annual concerts with the chamber orchestra of her old friend Eduard Melkus⁴⁶ in Vienna’s Albertina Museum. No one who knew her could imagine her vibrant current of energy ever diminishing or even vanishing.

To be continued.

Notes

1. “The Queen of Hearts,” title of a harpsichord piece by François Couperin, Pièces de clavecin IV, Ordre 21ème. 

2. André Raynaud, The Sounding Board, Number 19, May 2023, page 7. The British Harpsichord Society.

3. “Cinq minutes avec Huguette Dreyfus,” Musica, Journal Musical Français, Number 154, February 1967, Coupures de presse, BnF VM FONDS DRE 5 (3).

4. Il Informateur Corse, March 14, 1967, Coupures de presse, BnF, op. cit.

5. “Trois grands hivers: 1940, 1941, 1942,” Le corps, la famille et l’État, Hommage à André Burguière. Myriam Cottias, Laura Downs, et Christiane Klapisch-Zuber (dir.) Presse universitaires de Rennes, 2010.

6. “The Life of French Harpsichordist Huguette Dreyfus, Part 1,” The Diapason, March 2023, page 18.

7. Newspaper and date unknown. Coupures de presse, BnF, op. cit. 

8. “The Life of French Harpsichordist Huguette Dreyfus, Part 2,” The Diapason, April 2023, pages 14–15. 

9. Programs in author’s collection: Concours finals publics, Salle de Conservatoire, 1 October 1958 and Concours finals publics, Victoria Hall, vendredi 3 octobre 1958.

10. La Suisse, October 2, 1958, Coupures de presse, BnF, op. cit.

11. Maurice Imbert, Officiel des Spectacles, January 31, 1962, Coupures de presse, BnF, op. cit.

12. Claude Chamfray, Journal Musical Français, February 5, 1962, Coupures de presse, BnF, op. cit.

13. Lionel Salter, The Gramophone, London, June 1964, Coupures de presse, BnF, op. cit.

14. Daily American, Rome. Undated, but according to her concert programs and agendas, the review was most likely written in 1965. Coupures de presse, BnF, op. cit. 

15. Jean-Louis Gazignaire, Le Figaro, Paris, July 10, 1976, Coupures de presse, BnF, op. cit.

16. George Gallician, Le Meridional—La France, July 15, 1968, Coupures de presse, BnF, op. cit.

17. Reinhard von Nagel, Sounding Board, Number 19, page 7, op. cit.

18. René Geng, Mulhouse, undated but probably written in 1978, since she only performed there in 1958, 1978, and 2009. Coupures de presse, BnF, op. cit.

19. Extract of a letter dated November 22, 1978, from Theo Peters, former Consul General of the British Government at Anvers in Belgium, to Gordon C. Murray, who then sent it to Huguette Dreyfus on March 16, 1979. BnF, Correspondance non classée, 1967–1979, VM FONDS 145 DRE-1 (17).

20. Marie-Claire Jamet, interview with author, November 6, 2022, Flayosc, France.

21. Matthew Dirst, December 22, 2022, Sounding Board, Number 19, March 2023, page 23, op. cit. 

22. Eduard Melkus, interview with author, Baden, Austria, February 2022. 

23. Agendes, BnF, VM FONDS DRE-3 (5).

24. Jill Severs, video interview with author, January 18, 2023.

25. Huguette Dreyfus, interview with Valentina Ferri, Symphonia—I concerti per clavicembalo, April 1998.

26. Zuzana Ružicková, interview with author, February 2017, Prague, Czech Republic.

27. Královna cembala, page 106, Zuzana R˚užiˇcková with Marie Kulijevyová, Zentiva, Czech Republic. This extract was translated from Czech into English by Kamila Valkova Valenta.

28. Laurent Soumignac, telephone interview with author, October 6, 2022.

29. Agendes, BnF, op. cit. 

30. Letters from Abbé Pierre Raymond to Huguette Dreyfus from 1964 to 1970, BnF, Correspondance non classée, 1944–1969, VM FONDS 145 DRE-1 (16). 

31. Livre d’or, Clavecin en France, https://www.clavecin-en-france.org/spip.php?article288. 

32. Huguette Dreyfus, interview by Marcel Quillévére, “Les Traversées du Temps,” part 1, France Musique, March 7, 2012.

33. Having mentioned to students that she liked elephants after seeing them on a trip, Huguette ended up with a huge assortment of plush and ceramic elephants in all sizes that covered her pianoforte entirely.

34. Ruggero Gerlin, letter to Huguette Dreyfus, August 4, 1960, BnF, Correspondance non classée, op. cit.

35. Huguette Dreyfus, interview by Valentina Ferri, op. cit.

36. Huguette Dreyfus, interview by Myriam Soumignac, “Huguette Dreyfus: Portraits en musique,” France Musique, June 9, 1988, INA.

37. Huguette Dreyfus, interview by Myriam Soumignac, op. cit. 

38. Maria de Lourdes Cutolo, interview with author, May 13, 2018. 

39. “Domenico Scarlatti, 2/5: La vie en Espagne 1720–1757,” presented by Rémy Stricker, Radio France, July 9, 1985, INA.

40. Huguette Dreyfus, interview by Myriam Soumignac, op. cit.

41. Huguette’s complete discography is available at www.sallygordonmark.com and www.dolmetsch.com.

42. Kristian Nyquist, interview with author, March 5, 2022, Karlsruhe, Germany

43. Codex (Archiv Produktion), 453 173-2

44. Denon CO-75638/39, 1997

45. Denon CO-18037/38, 1997

46. The Capella Academica Wien, which Eduard Melkus in his 90s still conducts.

47. “My dear Miwako, Here I am back from an excellent stay in Hong-Kong with memories of a marvelous trip to Japan, in part thanks to you. I warmly thank you for your great kindness, both in the preparation of my voyage and during my stay. I especially appreciated your going out of your way to remain in Kyoto the last night. You facilitated the task of departure very much. Here, I am plunging immediately into a sea of work, running late and with problems of every sort, but that’s par for the course. My little Miwako, I wish with all my heart that your future will happen according to your desires, but I advise you to be alert and very prudent. That doesn’t prevent optimism at all. Keep your head high and be full of courage. With an affectionate kiss, Huguette Dreyfus.” (For more about the trip to Japan, see part 2 of this series, The Diapason, April 2023).