François Couperin

François Couperin was born in Paris on 10 November 1668 into a true musical dynasty. His uncle Louis Couperin, who died a few years before his birth, had been one of the greatest harpsichordists of his time, and since 1653 the family had held the organ loft of the church of Saint-Gervais in Paris. His father Charles, organist there, died in 1679, when François was only ten. The parish council decided to reserve the post for him until he turned eighteen; in the meantime Michel-Richard de Lalande filled in.

Trained by the organist Jacques Thomelin, young Couperin progressed so fast that he officially took over the Saint-Gervais organ in 1685, aged seventeen. He would soon be called “Couperin le Grand” to distinguish him from other family members. In 1689 he married Marie-Anne Ansault, with whom he had several children, including Marguerite-Antoinette, who became a court harpsichordist. In 1690 he published his Pièces d’orgue, two masses — one for parishes and one for convents — which are among the summits of French organ music.

In 1693 Louis XIV chose him as one of the four organists of the Chapel Royal, each serving one quarter of the year. Couperin also became harpsichord teacher to the royal children, notably the Duke of Burgundy, the king’s grandson. He was ennobled in 1696. He often played at the “Sunday concerts” held in the king’s apartments at Versailles, for which he composed the Concerts royaux, published in 1722.

Couperin was above all a master of the harpsichord. Between 1713 and 1730 he published four books of Pièces de clavecin, some 250 pieces grouped into twenty-seven “ordres”, or suites. Each piece bears a poetic, mysterious or humorous title: Les Barricades mystérieuses, Le Tic-toc-choc ou les Maillotins, Les Moissonneurs, Le Rossignol en amour, Les Ombres errantes. They are often little portraits of people at court or scenes from daily life.

In 1716 he published L’Art de toucher le clavecin, a method explaining how to place the hands, how to finger passages, how to perform ornaments and even how to sit and keep a pleasant expression while playing. Johann Sebastian Bach knew and admired the book. Couperin stresses the need to play with delicacy and expression, since the harpsichord cannot vary its volume by striking harder or softer.

Couperin also admired Italian music, especially Arcangelo Corelli’s sonatas. He sought to unite the French and Italian tastes, which were then sharply opposed. He composed trio sonatas, later gathered in Les Nations (1726), and two works in homage to the two masters: Le Parnasse ou l’Apothéose de Corelli (1724) and the Apothéose de Lully (1725), in which the two composers meet on Parnassus and end up playing together. He also wrote sacred music, notably three Leçons de ténèbres of great beauty.

His health declined in the 1720s. In 1730 he published his fourth and final book of harpsichord pieces and handed his court organist post to his cousin. He died in Paris on 11 September 1733. His influence was immense: Bach copied his pieces, and in the twentieth century Maurice Ravel paid tribute to him with Le Tombeau de Couperin, while Richard Strauss orchestrated several of his pieces. He remains one of the greatest figures of French Baroque music.