The great harpsichordist has passed away a few hours ago. He was ill since many years.
May he rest in peace.
As Ruckers would have said: Sic Transit Gloria Mundi 
Le 17/04/2020 11:57, Martin Gester via The Jackrail Ă©crit :
Cette Sarabande, solaire et apollinienne, qu’inaugure un geste qui monte vers les étoiles. https://soundcloud.com/martin_gester/js-bach-sarabande-in-d
More likely Sarabande in B flat, 1st Partita.
Hommage Ă Kenneth Gilbert,
éminent claveciniste et musicologue, qui s’en est allé rejoindre le firmament des arts.
(I hope you won’t mind this french intermedium)
Cette Sarabande, solaire et apollinienne, qu’inaugure un geste qui monte vers les étoiles. https://soundcloud.com/martin_gester/js-bach-sarabande-in-d
J’avais fait un bout de chemin avec Kenneth. Un homme aussi aimable que cultivé.
Un jour, je lui ai joué, notamment, une Partita (Praeambulum, Partita 5) dans un style brillant et, quelque peu, emporté. Il m’a dit : Martin, ne pensez-vous pas que l’art de cette époque est plus rayonnant qu’emporté, plus solaire que passionné ? Cela m’avais fait réfléchir.
(en passant : comme Kenneth aimait à parler d’éditions et de différences d’ornements et de détails, je venais parfois le provoquer en venant avec une édition de la Bach Gesellschaft, mais annotée par Czerny que j’avais achetée, étudiant, “à l’Est” (DDR) - où il y avait toutes les notes, mais un tas d’autres choses que je ne regardais pas.
Cela coupait court aux développements sur les éditions. Kenneth me disait : “bon, l’édition… Enfin, vous ne tenez pas compte de tous ces ajouts, donc parlons d’autre chose…”
Et on parlait d’Apollon et de Dionysos)
Fixed ! Thank you, Dennis
In these times where a lot of good knowledge and practice of early music is given for granted, it is good to remember those few who made it possible, remarkably among them Kenneth Gilbert.
He was a specialist in French Baroque music, and, as we all know, one of the basics of the performance of this style are the “notes inégales”.
But you will hardly find any recording with inégales prior to the 1970s, because few knew anything about them or how to perform them.
The matter was only researched in the 1960s, and the first “how to” directions appeared in David Lasocki’s long Introduction to Hotteterre’s “Principles of the Flute …” in English, London 1968. A very useful text, with many useful insights, although still relatively incomplete: we needed to hear a performing reconstruction of French style, with its inégales, articulation, ornaments and everything else.
Enter Kenneth Gilbert.
He recorded F. Couperin’s Premier Livre in 1970. When months after the recording a LP record was issued with the Premier Ordre, I happened to be in Paris, where Hubert Bédard gave me this LP. We heard the record in awe: “Ah, hah! This is the way!”. An impressive achievement indeed.
As we all know, in the following few years K. Gilbert completed his F. Couperin recordings, issued first in LP boxes and years later in CDs. (I had the honour of meeting K. GIlbert in 1975 chez BĂ©dard.)
Half a century later, playing French Baroque music in modern times has clearly two eras: before Kenneth Gilbert’s 1970 milestone, and after him.
Please allow me to extend this to a reflection on the value of enthusiastic scholarship, as so often evident here in The Jackrail.
As a continuo specialist in the Twin Cities active early music scene, I’m too often surprised by a lack of “notes inégales” understanding. Of course, the main challenge is a common presumption that it must be something exact. And always
the same, or not at all. (Jimmy Caldwell at the Oberlin Institute would solve this by telling us to think like Bing Crosby.)
But my surprise comes because I’ve known about inégales for a very long time. I was introduced to it and the French baroque in 1973 as a young organ student in Moorhead, Minnesota, of all places. I remember being told by our wildly enthusiastic
organ teacher Ruth Berge that there was a historic treatise saying essentially “someday, they will play our music and have no idea what to do, because we don’t notate how we play it.”.
How did Ruth know about inégales? She had studied in Paris with Marie Claire Alain and took it all in. By all accounts, Marie was as wildly enthusiastic a teacher as Ruth.
How did Marie Claire know about inégales? I wonder if she heard Kenneth… Maybe they shared croissants and coffee too.
Thanks everyone, for sharing equally.
Bruce
AFAIK the first organist who used to play « notes inégales » was Michel Chapuis.
In France, organists (some, not all !) were at the forefront of research in the field of early music - like string players, conductors or harpsichordists elsewhere.
This recording has been released in 1967…
https://open.spotify.com/album/7FOdxSsA3ePfCsCbfQWsOU?si=Q_7J5GcASju7iwQoALJeMw
(Notes inégales, yes, and the right organ, but it’s far from a really authentic style : notes inégales are part of a mouvement that makes them natural, as do unequal beats, dance steps etc which are far from been self evident, even today).
If I may be permitted a couple of
comments on this topic:
I'm sure that I'd heard of notes inégales before 1970, the date
mentioned by CdV; it was a sufficiently known aspect of French
performance when I was studying at the U. of Cal. in Berkeley, in
the years before 1969, tho I wasn’t specifically studying keyboard
performance of performance practice.
And I wonder whether the organ @ St. Maximin is truly "the right
organ" for F. Couperin’s organ works. This organ is from 1772-74,
according to http://orgue-saintmaximin.com/
, but the organ works are from the 1689-90, according to
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fran%C3%A7ois_Couperin#Organ](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fran%C3%A7ois_Couperin#Organ)
. We know, or think, that French organ building was less subject
to changing taste during this period of nearly a century than was
German organ building, but I can’t imagine that there were no
significant developments. Probably others can point to sources
that will support or falsify my impressions.
Regards,
Dale
1 Like
AFAIK the first person to seriously study inégales was North American flautist Betty Bang Mather, a few years before Lasocki’s book of 1968, but I understand that her work was mostly a collection of sources and hardly circulated outside the USA. Therefore I am not surprised that she had followers in California. Anyway we are straying away from the passing of K. Gilbert, who in 1970 was certainly the first harpsichordist commercially-recording (extensively and correctly and most musically) inégales.
Right as for the organ (saint Maximin with a quasi ET tuning, Poitiers etc).
Until very recently, French baroque organ works were mostly performed on later organs, or transformed ones (enlarged, generally)
Baroque registrations work on them and they sound quite magnificently, but yes, it’s like recording F. Couperin on a Taskin.
But it was a big step forward after recordings of « new baroque » instruments.
Martin GESTER
+33 (0)661 79 47 75 (mob)
http://www.hear.fr/academie/index.php
Message parfois dicté / possibly dictated…
Dear Martin, let me respond offtopic to your post.
You wrote:
“AFAIK the first organist who used to play « notes inégales » was Michel Chapuis.
… far from a really authentic style : notes inégales are part of a mouvement that makes them natural … far from being self evident …”
And indeed, the recording in YouTube is dated 1963 and Chapuis does inégales, but there are two issues: 1) he plays triplets, which is exceptional: most inégales are more subtle and 2) he does it very mechanically. But well, this was 1963 and at the time it was a first attempt…
(Not to mention the many, many ornaments played before the beat, and the use of 16’ flutes on the pedals and 16’ trombones with the trumpets, which AFAIK were not found in French
organs in F.Couperin’s prime).
Dear Claudio,
You’re totally right.
I quoted him and the year because it was about « inegales », and about who started it, historically.
Michel Chapuis was never my cup of tea, but he was starting something, and he influenced generations of musicians, at least in Europe.
There was still a long way left…
Best
M
1 Like
Betty Louise Lumby was teaching inegales on organ and harpsichord in the early 70s when I started studying with her. I think she got it from Alain.
Dr. Margo Dillard
Organist/Handbell Director, First United Methodist Church, Lewisville, Texas
Dillard Piano and Organ Studio
doctormargo@gmail.com
#joychurch #lovelikeJesus
Le 17/04/2020 23:25, Claudio Di Veroli via The Jackrail Ă©crit :
AFAIK the first person to seriously study inégales was North American flautist Betty Bang Mother, a few years before Lasocki’s book of 1968, but I understand that her work was mostly a collection of sources and hardly circulated outside the USA. Therefore I am not surprised that she had followers in California. Anyway we are straying away from the passing of K. Gilbert, who in 1970 was certainly the first harpsichordist commercially-recording (extensively and correctly and most musically) inégales.
Eugène Borrel published an article as early as 1931: “Les notes inégales
dans l’ancienne musique francaise”.
Revue de Musicologie
T. 12, No. 40 (Nov., 1931), pp. 278-289 (12 pages)
Published by: Société Française de Musicologie
https://www.jstor.org/stable/925651
(And here a more recent article by Olivier Baumont:
Olivier Baumont, «Les notes inégales en musique française : ce que nous
apprennent les « ètrangers »»,
La Revue du Conservatoire [En ligne],
Les notes inégales en musique française : ce que nous apprennent les « ètrangers ». )
Correct Dennis! And precisely in 1931 the first modern edition of F. Couperin’s L’Art was issued with translations. However, the treatment of inégales by him and St.Lambert and many others is limited to a few details: by far the most complete treatment is in Hotteterre’s L’Art de Préluder, not generally available/known before Lasocki. He was the first to explain the fundamental importance and meaning of Hotteterre. I am surprised that Beaumont does not mention Hotteterre in his article. Anyway I knew his interesting article. Have no access to Borrel 1931, it would be interesting to read it …
Just got a copy and read Borrel. Excellent treatment at such an early date. As often in the literature, in the attempt to mention different sources with their (minor) discrepancies, one sometimes misses an “average” or “conclusion” or “to do” for the modern student. But anyway, the important concepts are there. Accordingly, the leading harpsichordist at the time, Wanda Landowska, in her prime in France, boasting to be well read, surely read the article by Borrel and played some inégales … but for some strange reason, I cannot recollect a single inégale by Landowska, or else in the 1950’s by any of the important harpsichordists recording at the time, or even in the 1960s (i.e. before K.Gilbert) by … ehm, OK let us stop here, and I am awaiting the counterexamples!