Supreme among French composers of the Baroque era, François Couperin made his career at the court of Louis XIV. His creativity is manifest in his sacred music, chamber music and, above all, his abundant corpus of keyboard works, here presented complete in recordings by the harpsichordist Laurence Boulay in their first CD release. Interpretations on the piano come from such figures as Marcelle Meyer and Georges Cziffra, while other contributors to this collection, representing diverse schools of performance, include William Christie, Christophe Rousset and John Eliot Gardiner.
B**D
Fairly good collection
The clavecin recordings date from the 70s, but are adequate if not exceptional. A really good collection would have the Hesperion XX recording of Les Nations conducted by Jordi Savall, for example, and most definitely the Scott Ross complete works for harpsichord, currently not available.
T**F
Good But Disappointed
My disappointment stems from the interpretations of some of the pieces. This is a fantastic collection of some rather rare music. But the more well know pieces are played and recorded differently than the other works within the same book. Maybe the recordings are from different studios and performers; just odd they are that different on the same CD, idk. The attempt to convey emotion in the style of play by adjusting tempo and not letting the beauty of the harpsichord reverberate and ring through in some of the recordings rather than letting the music speak for itself was not successful and ruined the remarkable work of Couperin. The 16 CDs are well packaged and in individual sleeves. Easy to sort thought and a booklet with a good table of contents. The overall quality of the recordings are good, and if you are not familiar with the works one can thoroughly enjoy these recordings. But if you know this music I suggest finding a different collection/performance.
M**E
Gorgeous harmonically
I had heard some Couperin before but the harmonies buried in here are superb. At less than £2 per disk, who could complain.
D**R
An excellent set of Couperin
To celebrate the 350th anniversary of Francois Couperin's birth, Erato has released this box set of 18 CDs. All these tracks have been available previously, many on LP and CD, recorded over a few decades, but the quality of the recordings is excellent. This isn't a complete collection of Couperin's works, but it does include all the known keyboard works, and as such as a significant achievement. There's also sacred works and some chamber works in the collection, although neither is a compete survey of Couperin's works as far as I can tell, but they do represent a significant amount of both genres, and certainly the more popular works.The performance here are excellent, and along with the engineering excellence makes for a wonderful collection of Couperin's music at a competitive price. Considering some of these keyboard recordings date from the 1970s, the quality is impressive. For those who like Couperin's keyboard works, this is a significant release as it's the only complete set of keyboard pieces I know of in the currently available market. Considering the price-per-CD of this box, it's a no-brainer to add to your collection.
O**N
Excelentes versiones y registros.
Excelente colección de las obras más representativas de Couperin. Compré el box set completo especialmente por la obra integral para clavecin de la cual tengo tres versiones diferentes. Esta me parece muy buena. La grabación es de primera, en ocasiones demasiado detallada; tanto, que se pueden oír muchos ruidos inherentes al instrumento. Ejecutada con instrumentos de época le da más valor aún. De todas las demás obras del box set no puedo dar ninguna opinión todavía pues no he tenido oportunidad de escucharlas aún. Pero el conjunto de las grabaciones vale mucho la pena. No me gusta alabar o criticar los registros por su precio tal y cual lo hacen muy frecuentemente algunos amantes de la música clásica, sobre todo de otros países. Yo siempre comento que la calidad cuesta, así que si les interesa esta colección adquiéranla antes de que se agote.
M**I
Divine melodie
Divine melodie interpretate magistralmente. Non mi stanco mai di ascoltarle. Tanti CD al un prezzo contenuto.
H**E
Intéressant mais interprétation souvent datée.
Somme intéressante pour très peu d'argent, mais interprétation des nombreuses oeuvres au clavecin trop mécanique...
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