L'Entretien des Dieux
In 1672, the founder of the French harpsichordschool Jacques Champion de Chambonnières, died. He was famous for his refined toucher and the eloquence of his compositions. His pupil d'Anglebert honours him with a tombeau. Unlike his contempories Louis Couperin, Denis Gaultier, Jean-Nicolas Geoffroy and Johann Jakob Froberger he composes this special piece in the positive and radiant key of D-major, therewith giving it the character of an homage.
When d'Anglebert decides to rework the lute compositions by Ennemond Gaultier he does not merely make mere transcriptions of those pieces. Instead he tries to imitate the lute's tremendous sonority by writing effects typical for the harpsichord which nevertheless recall the lute's expressiveness. The drawings that Pieter Paul Rubens made while on grand tour in Italy come to mind. He also tries to copy what he sees, but nevertheless they unmistakenbly bear the hallmarks of the Flemish painter...
L.N.Clérambault tries in his pieces not only to write in the developed french style, but also to incorporate some italian influences, for instance in the rather italianate gigue. It is in these works that one clearly sees upon which foundations F.Couperin could rely.
When the French revolution breaks out on July the fourteenth 1789 french harpsichord music is already at a dead end. The following day J.Duphly would die, while some months before Armand Louis Couperin was killed in a road accident. Claude Balbastre tries to pacify the new regime in writing an arrangement of the Marseillaise for the fortepiano.
New keyboard virtuosi who advocate the fortepiano take to the stage and this is clearly audible in some rondeau's by Duphly and especially Royer. At the end of that century many harpsichords are being confiscated by the new republican regime or are discarded of and replaced by fortepiano's. Some time after that countless instruments end their lives dishonourably as fuel for heating classrooms of the newly founded Conservatoire... But before this happens, French harpsichordmusic sounds for one last time as it had done for over one and a halve century: perfectly written for the instrument, with greatness, voluptious and worthy of the typical French "gloire".
