PURCELL: Harpsichord Suites

Charlston, Terence R.

8.553982

Purcell's eight Suites exhibit a profound understanding of late seventeenth century keyboard idiom and such subtle pieces were obviously written with the discerning player in mind. The popular market, it seems, was more interested in the theatre and its music and the later reprints of A choice Collection of Lessons included six transcription of theatre music to offset any imbalance in the collection which might affect sales. • Included here are four previously unrecorded contemporary arrangements. They are all based on original overtures by Purcell and reflect the popularity of this type of piece. The tradition of orchestral transcription seems to have been imported from France where d'Anglebert in particular had made a specialty of reworking Lully's overtures as virtuoso harpsichord pieces. The English players incorporated arrangements by other composers into their suites of pieces and the performance of a suite restricted to a single composer must have been exceptional. They were often careless about acknowledging the original source and composer, making the task of ascription very difficult today. The transcriptions were certainly associated with Purcell's Suites. The Overture in gamut flat, for example, was written on blank pages at the back of a copy of A choice Collection of Lessons now in the British Library. Similarly, the only source of the Overture in C (Bonduca) places it before the Fifth Suite as an additional or alternative prelude.

CD x 1

Naxos

5/8/00

730099498227