Word: couperin
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...most delightful piece on the program (and also that best suited to the talents of the Bach Society) was Couperin's Le Parnasse ou l'apotheose de Corelli. Hathaway played his own harpsichord part, waving a free hand whenever possible at the small group on either side. He seemed caught in the middle in more than one way, however, since the violins and cellos often disagreed on the tempo, the one rushing ahead of Hathaway and the other lagging behind. For the rest the performance was superb--the parts all meshed and precision triumphed over muddle. The programmatic aspect...
...Renaissance an epidemic of flute playing swept across Europe. Henry VIII owned 148 flutes and tootled several hours a day. Frederick the Great of Prussia caught flute fever as a boy, and hid his teacher in a closet to escape the wrath of his flute-hating father. Though Couperin, Telemann, Vivaldi, Bach and Handel wrote stacks of magnificent music for it, the flute in those days was easy to hate. ("You ask me what is worse than a flute?" Cherubini once snarled. "Two flutes!") Like most simple instruments it was difficult to play well, but so easy to play badly...
...great liberties in interpretation, serenely confident of the backing of the dead composer. "You continue to play Bach your way," she told one musician. "I shall continue to play Bach his way. What I do is comparable to the improvisations of a good jazz band," she explained. "Did Bach, Couperin and Scarlatti play the harpsichord to preserve historical truth or because on this instrument they were able to express passion, joy or despair...
...course they were. Scarlatti, she says, "is the only composer who reminds me of the playfulness of a cat, and he does not suffer from this comparison. We all have seen a kitten play with a twig. It is impossible to describe its grace, charm, vivacity and inventiveness." Couperin's work, she observed, has "an immutable and restricted frame. He moves in it with ease, as did the actresses and dancers of the past, even though they were tightly laced in their corsets." As for Saint-Saëns, she noted that he was considered a master of form...
...question was Louis XIV, who wanted music for every occasion. The supper "symphonies" by Michel-Richard de Lalande are stately, danceable airs. There are also fanfares and military marches by Jean-Baptiste Lully, the musical dictator of the court, and an engaging trio sonata for violins by Francois Couperin. The highly stylized little pieces are given a bright, clear reading by the Collegium Musicum de Paris under Roland Douatte...