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1 LP -
1C 063-30 935 Q - (p) 1977
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1 CD - 8
26503 2 - (c) 2000 |
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1 CD -
CDM 7 63070 2 - (c) 1989 |
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AIR DE COUR -
Airs à Boire, Chants sous la Règne de
Louis XIII |
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- Eau vive,
source d'amour (Jacques
Mauduit, 1557-1627) |
3' 09" |
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- C'est un mant,
ouvrez la porte (Anonym) |
1' 07" |
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- Si je languis
d'un martire incogneu (Joachim
Thibaut de Courville, um 1535-1581) |
2' 27" |
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- Un jour que ma
rebelle (Gabriel Bataille,
1575-1630) |
1' 19" |
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Si jamais mon âme blessée
(Pierre Guédron (?), 2. Hälfte des
16. Jhdt. - 1621) |
2' 44" |
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- Cessés mortels
de soupirer (Pierre Guédron (?),
2. Hälfte des 16. Jhdt. - 1621) |
5' 55" |
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- Ma bergère non
légère (Gabriel Bataille,
1575-1630) |
2' 21" |
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- Quel espoir de
guarir (Pierre Guédron (?),
2. Hälfte des 16. Jhdt. - 1621) |
3' 50" |
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- Qui veut
chasser une migraine (Gabriel Bataille,
1575-1630) |
2' 36" |
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- Petit sein où l'Amour a
bâti son séjour (François le
Fegueux, ?-?) |
1' 25" |
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- Paisible et ténébreuse
nuit (Étienne Moulinié, um 1600 -
nach 1669?) |
2' 59" |
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- Plaignez la rigueur de mon
sort (Antoine Boësset, 1585?-1643) |
1' 54" |
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- Quelque
merveilleuse
chose (Étienne Moulinié, um 1600 - nach
1669?) |
2' 22" |
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- N'espérez
plus, mes yeux (Antoine Boësset, 1585?-1643) |
3' 11" |
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- Lors que tes beaux yeux
mignonne (Grand Rue, ?-?) |
1' 30" |
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- Ennuits,
désespoirs et
douleurs (Antoine Boësset, 1585?-1643) |
4' 32" |
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- Je
suis ravi de
mon Uranie (Étienne Moulinié, um 1600 - nach
1669?) |
2' 23" |
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- Enfin
la beauté que
j'adore (Étienne Moulinié, um 1600 - nach
1669?) |
6' 08" |
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Nigel Rogers,
Tenor |
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Anthony Bailes,
Laute |
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Luogo
e data di registrazione |
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Evagelische
Kirche, Séon (Svizzera) - 6-9
settembre 1976 |
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Registrazione: live /
studio |
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studio |
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Producer / Engineer |
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Gerd
Berg / Johann-Nikolaus Matthes
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Prima Edizione LP |
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EMI
Electrola "Reflexe" - 1C 063-30
935 Q - (1 lp) - durata 52' 36" -
(p) 1977 - Analogico (Quadraphonic) |
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Prima Edizione CD |
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EMI
"Classics" - CDM 7 63070 2 - (1
cd) - durata 52' 36" - (c) 1989 -
ADD |
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Edizione CD |
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EMI
"Classics" - 8 26503 2 - (1 cd) -
durata 52' 36" - (c) 2000 - ADD |
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Note |
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AIRS DE COUR
At first sight the French air
de cour of the 18th
century seems to be the most
spontaneous musical expression
of the time. The clarity of
its structure, the fullness of
inspiration - despite of its
poetical preciosity, its
intimate atmosphere make us
forget that in actual fact
there had been a long process
of hard work during which the
polyphonic music of the
Renaissance was gradually
receding into the background,
eventually making way for the
accompanied air, which was
enthusiastically cultivated
during the reign of Louis XIII.
The history of vocal music in
France in the course of the
16th century is rather
complex. Around 1530 we find
two simultaneous, antagonistic
tendencies, which are most
likely subject to the literary
evolution of the time: There
is, on one side, the old
polyphonic song, sumptuous
setting for the most
distinguished poetical forms,
and, on the other, those voix
de ville or vaudevilles
coming from Paris, polyphonic
or monodic works which are
light, easy to understand and
in keeping with the mentality
of the people, and by the end
of the century they had become
entirely successful. These
sort of songs make a big point
of the text or even each word,
which fact is perhaps the
result of the influence
exerced upon the type by
French humanists and Italian
madrigalists. From this time
on the advocates of the new
style did without the
traditional poetic forms and
preferred strophic texts with
or without refrain sung to
only one melody; the syllabic
notation favoured homophony,
while great importance was
attached to the upper voice in
the vocal setting. In
about 1570 the Académie de
Poésie et de
Musique was founded by
Jean Antoine de Baïf, and
they tried to unite these two
styles, applying a standard as
strict as it was the rule in
the lyric poetry of antiquity.
So it was in the course of
some decades that French vocal
music brought about a quite
new style: the air
whose rhythm sometimes a
little rigid would become more
and more flexible in contact
with a more and more subtile
literary style.
In this
short review of the aesthetic
and formal transformations
conditioning the development
of the air de cour we
did not make mention of a
practice that gave the type
its own peculiar coloration
and charm. The lute song had
actually existed for quite a
long time, and we do not have
to go back to the age of the
troubadours, because the
publications by Franciscus
Bossinensis (1509), Arnolt
Schlick (1512), Pierre
Attaignant (1529) or Pierre
Phalèse
(1553) furnish evidence of a
refined art having for the
most part developed from
polyphonic vocal works, which
were adapted and so to speak
miniaturized for the stringed
instrument, which is an ideal
support of the voice. As to
the term air de cour,
it appears for the first time
on the front page of the
anthology published in 1571 by
the Paris editor, composer and
lutenist Adrian Le Roy, an
anthology in which he confines
himself to adapting the
polyphonic airs which the
royal organist Nicolas de la
Grotte had composed on poems
by Ronsard
and his contemporaries. The
choice of the term shows how
enthusiastic the nobility felt
for this new song form:
Outside of France we must
mention Emanual Adriaenssen,
who published his books in
Antwerp, and Jean-Baptiste
Besard from Besançon,
whose copious anthology
appeared in Cologne; both made
this repertory known and
invited others to imitation.
But in its country of origin
the song-book entitled Livre
d’Airs de cour, miz sur le
luth had been the only
of its sort for a long time.
For it was not only an age of
political and religious
troubles, it was also a period
of transition in the field of
language, poetry and music.
The position of the lute,
however, symbol of
instrumental perfection, was
jeopardized again by its most
illustrious masters. Its
stands to reason that this
climate of insecurity hardly
encouraged the publication of
such costly works as were the
lute tablatures. But this
period of obvious barrenness
enabled at least some printers
such as Ballard, for instance,
to produce a typography
distinguished by its clarity
and adequacy to the new style
which was developing. This new
typography gave all the
anthologies that were going to
be published an aspect of
uniform beauty.
This period, which began
during the reign of King Henry
IV, continued under Louis XIII
and finished as later as with
Louis XV’s accession to the
throne, was a second Golden
Age in the history of the
lute. This was the moment when
France, striking up her own
song in the concert of
nations, put an end to the
Italian supremacy and dictated
her own laws to the artists
from all over Europe. From now
on the lute was the French
instrument par excellence,
which enthused all classes of
the population. The instrument
was worshipped like a God, it
was “the arbitrator of love,
peace and war”, and Abraham
Bosse represented it on the
front page of his book Rhétorique
des Dieux,* a
worshipping which the
distinguished society as well
as the common people indulged
in so passionately that they
all were severely criticized
by the moralists of the time.
We must mention that the lute,
emblem of poetry, was also the
symbol of the historic fashion
which was so often decried and
which we know under the name
of préciosité. We will
look out in vain for the sense
of harmony and moderation in
the first generation of the précieux,
the particular taste that made
them of all people the
forerunners of the classics.
On the contrary, the
stiltedness, hyperbole,
affectedness of the style
entered into competition with
an antiquated, pithless,
out-of-date Petrarcism. When
in 1608 the song-book Airs
de différents autheurs, mis
en tablature de luth par
Gabriel Bataille was
published by Pierre Ballard,
first instance of a long
series of similar anthologies,
the texts chosen by some of
the most illustrious musicians
during the reign of Louis XIII
showed only few exceptions to
the rule. Songs, recitatives
and stanzas carelessly rhymed
by poor poets whose anonymity
is often hard to penetrate
were most frequent; and if
some of the pieces happened to
go by the name of a Desportes,
Malherbe
or Rapin, they rarely did
credit to their authors.
Following the example of their
colleagues in England, the
composers of French airs
were in quest of ductile
material in the texts
conditioning the liberty and
fluidity of their songs: What
had been only dullness and
convention was now going to be
transformed into a flexible
form of subtile unity: The
lute song, often integrated
into the ballets of the court,
which was a throughout
national institution,
represented from then on the
most authentic expression of
the musical art in France. In
England, Guédron
appeared beside John Dowland
and Giulio Caccini in the
song-book entitled A
Musicall Banquet (1610)
by Robert
Dowland, the son of the famous
lutenist, and some years later
Edward Filmer published a
remarkable anthology
containing nineteen French
Court-Aires, with their
Ditties Englished, of four
or five parts, together with
that of the lute...
(1629). In the German-speaking
countries, Heinrich Albert,
father of the German lied,
also made a contribution to
the French school in his book
Arien oder Melodeien
(1638-1650)... and numerous
were also the amateurs who,
eager for novelties, copied
the airs de cour into small
note-books, the conventional
repertory of “Hausmusik”.
Mention must also be made of
the Netherlands, where this
kind of music was greatly
appreciated as becomes aparent
from Constantin Huygens’s
correspondence; in the third
part of his Parthodia
sacra et profana, he
took a pride in disclosing the
source of his inspiration. In
our days libraries all over
the world remind us of this
exceptional fashion, since at
all times these anthologies
with French airs for voice and
lute have belonged to the best
represented works of the
musical bibliograhy.
The structure of the air
de cour is quite simple.
Its syllabic character
excluding textual repetition
produces phrases that are in
conformity with the verses and
therefore all of different
length. The bar-lines, which
appear only at the end of the
verse, give an impression of
liberty and are often
misleading to those who ignore
the problems of prosody and
rhythm of the period. The
melodies are often divided
into parts the first of which
may be repeated; if the text
has a refrain, it is only this
part that is repeated.
Sometimes it is the composer
himself who ornaments these
restatements, but most
frequently they are improvised
by the performer who is out
for displaying his
inventiveness and virtuosity.
This practice - it was the
standard that had been applied
to a singer’s quality until
very recently - bears upon
mainly two complimentary
elements:
1)
the ornamentation which, by
means of accents, portamenti,
tremolos, passage notes,
cadences and all other vocal
artifices, emphasizes one
syllable, one significant word
ofthe text -
2) the diminutions embracing
more and more important parts
of the melody (if it consists
of long notes) and, early in
the century, almost
automatically produce doubles,
real variations allowing the
virtuosos to transform their
songs in a way that was to
extort infinite admiration
from the baroque audience. It
stands to reason that we must
make a big point of the
influence that came from
Italy: In the winter of
1604/05, Giulio Caccini was
staying at the court of
King Henry IV with his wife
and two daughters, and they
must have left a lasting
impression on those who had
the chance of listening to the
celebrated advocates of the nuove
musiche. And even if Père
Mersenne could not but accept
the Italians’ supremacy in the
sixth volume of his Harmonia
Universelle
(1636), where he stated that
they were “piquing themselves
on singing well and knowing
music much better than the
French”, even if he referred
to the works by “Jules Caccin,
called the Roman” and Jiacopo
Peri, he also suggested in
which way the theatrical,
passionate declamatory style
he had just described ought to
conform to the French douceur
so as to suite his
compatriots’ taste. It is most
interesting to see that the
Italians were not at all
indifferent to their
neighbours' researches and
went to the source so as to
study the bel canto a la
francese.
The differences between the
two conceptions, with the
Italian monodic style
cultivated by the “Camarata”
in Florence on one side and
the French air of the first
third of the 17th century on
the other are also to be found
in the field of accompaniment.
Beyond the Alps, they
preferred the glorious timbre
of the chitarrone so as to
realize, al arbitrario del
sonatore, a bass
accompaniment with at times
scrupulously exact figuring,
whereas the French, faithful
to the intimate, mysterious
sound of the lute with its
gutstrings, had the
accompanying parts to their
airs engraved in tablature.
Despite of the higher
tessitura used in favour of
the “extraordinary chords” the
lute maintained the "old
sound" of its origin, just as
well as the theorbo,
indispensable instrument to
the air composers of
the following generation. The
instrument with ten duplicated
strings, celebrated by
Francisque, Nicolas Vallet or
Robert Ballard, was
appropriate for the
accompaniment to the airs
in a higher tessitura, which
here and there adapted a
detail from the polyphonic
version published
synchronically in these first
years of the century. But most
frequently we find a simple,
independent, chordal
accompaniment; easy to play
for the amateur it might also
have been the point from where
the skilful lutenist could
start to extemporize his part.
Lastly some remarks on the
composers of the works in the
present anthology some of
which have been recorded for
the first time. With the
exception of Joachim Thibaut
de Courville and Jacques
Mauduit, both musicians in
contact with Antoine de Baïf’s
literary circle and here
representing the air de
cour at the beginning of
its development; also with the
exception of Jean-Baptiste
Besard (c. 1567 - after 1617),
universal genius and lute
virtuoso, author of two
invaluable methodical
anthologies, all air de
cour composers were born
in the last third of the 16th
century.
The oldest of the musicians,
Pierre Guédron,
in 1613 “Intendant des
Musiques de la
Chambre" of the King and Queen
Mother was particularly active
in the domain of the ballet
de cour and polyphonic
or monodic music. The 150 airs
de cour or so with lute
accompaniment, which he had
published by his friends
between 1608 and 1620, prove
his dramatic temper and his
preference for expressive
declamation. The air Cessés
mortels de soupirer the
first phrase of which is not
without a reminiscence of John
Dowland’s famous work Lacrimae
proved so successful that it
was cited in Charles Sorel’s Histoire
comique de Francion
(1623).
Antoine Boesset, Sieur de
Villedieu, Guédron’s
son-in-law, succeeded him in
all his offices when Guédron
died. Being an excellent
singer and most admired by
Luigi Rossi, he gave his airs
de cour the charm and
flexibility we often try to
find in vain in the pieces his
father-in-law had composed.
Seven books containing airs
de cour with lute
tablature present works whose
genuine beauty seems to come
up to Decartes’s ideal, who
took the view that “music had
to delight us and arouse a
variety of feelings". N’espérez
plus mes yeux gives us
an idea of the range of vocal
virtuosity commonly found in
the 17th century: after the
simple song without any
ornamentation whatever there
are three examples of
diminutions chosen from those
written down by Père
Mesenne in accordance with the
“best and most experienced
masters and those meeting with
public approval“: Moulinié, Le
Bailly - who is said to have
been the father of this kind
of singing - and Monsieur
Boesset.
And as to Gabriel Bataille, it
redounds to his credit that he
was the first to publish the
first anthology of airs de
cour, soon followed by
other volumes which were
published regularly until
1615. He was a lutenist and
Marie de Médicis’s and Anna of
Austria’s music teacher, and
he played an important part in
view of the royal ballets.
Eager to contribute to the
prestige of the air de
cour, he avidly
transcribed polyphonic works
composed in the generation
before him as well as by his
contemporaries, and himself
wrote about fifty airs in his
own style, which are
considered the gayest and
wittiest songs of the type.
The youngest of the group,
Etienne Moulinié, born in
Languedoc, was “Chef de la
Musique de Monseigneur le Duc
d‘Orléans, frère
unique du Roy” in 1628, a
position he held until 1660,
when the prince died. As a
singer he enjoyed a high
reputation, and his six books
of airs de cour
discredited him with the
public, for it was a style
that had had its day. In vain
did he try to flatter his
audience when introducing into
his book Italian, Spanish and
Gascon melodies with guitar
accompaniment, an instrument
that was a great success at
the time. The troubles of the
Fronde caused a dangerous
interruption to the publishing
of his works, and some years
later, his returning home in
his native country marked the
irrevocable end of the air
de cour, this subtile,
moving, frail and unique type
of musical writing.
Claude
Chauvel
Translation
by Gudrun Meier
* This was the title of the
sumptuous anthology “published
c. 1650 and containing the
finest pieces for lute by the
illustrious composer Denis
Gaultier” and Ennemond, his
cousin.
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EMI Electrola
"Reflexe"
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