Tombeau: Couperin & Ravel

Fri 25 April at 7pm
Music
Baroque Music Festival
Celebration of Maurice Ravel’s 150th Birthday

Le Tombeau de Couperin harks back both to the time of Louis XIV and to the years of the Great War, when Maurice Ravel left composing to serve as a driver in the French military. Initially published in 1919 as a piano solo suite of six movements, it was reimagined in 1920 as a ballet in four movements (Prélude followed by three Baroque Dances: Forlane, Menuet, Rigaudon). The movements were dedicated to fallen soldiers who were personal friends and associates.

This programme juxtaposes Le Tombeau de Couperin with dances from the time of François Couperin and excerpts from the original Concerts Royaux, on which Ravel based his work. By presenting this 20th century suite alongside the Baroque music and dance that inspired it, we hope to give the audience a unique insight into Ravel’s creative process.

In addition, two sets of three chansons, one by Couperin and the other by Ravel, will be sung by Early Music vocalist Héloïse Bernard. Also featured will be Tiffany Vong on harpsichord and Tim Macdonald on Baroque violin.

Baroque dances, with music by Jean-Baptiste Lully, Jacques Cordier, André Campra and André Cardinal Destouches, echo the keyboard suites, which will be performed by Edinburgh-based Historical Dance & Music Ensemble Autrefois, led by Talitha MacKenzie, graduate of the New England Conservatory of Music and lecturer in Historical Dance at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. 

The Tombeau Project is in celebration of the 150th anniversary of Maurice Ravel (7 Mar 1875-28 December 1937). 

  • Price: £12 for French Institute members | £15 non-members
  • Where: at the Institut français d'Écosse in Edinburgh
  • More information: Doors open 15 minutes before the concert

Bookings

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Programme

Concerts Royaux, Premier Concert : Menuet en Trio, François Couperin, 1714
Baroque Dance performed by Autrefois
• Le Menuet du Chevalier – Contredanse by Feuïllet, 1706
Trois Chansons : Airs Sérieux, by François Couperin, 1711:
• Qu’on ne me dise plus que c’est la seule absence
• Doux liens de mon Coeur
• Zephire, modère en ces lieux
Concerts Royaux, Quatrième Concert, François Couperin (1714):
• Prélude
• Allemande
• Courante Françoise
• Courante l’Italiene
• Sarabande
• Rigaudon
• Forlane
Interval
Baroque Dance performed by Autrefois :
• L’Allemande, by Lully, choreography by Pécour, 1702
• La Bocanes, by Cordier, choreography attrib Bocane, end 17th c
• Sarabande à deux, from Tancrède, by Campra, choreography by Pécour, 1704
• La Lorraine – Rigaudon, choreography by Balon, 1719
• Muszette à deux – from Callirhoé by Destouches; choreography by Pécour, 1713
• La Triomphante – Forlane by Campra; choreography by Feuïllet, 1705
Interval
Trois Chansons, by Maurice Ravel, 1914 :
• Trois beaux oiseaux du paradis
• Nicolette
• Ronde
Le Tombeau de Couperin, Maurice Ravel
• Prélude (à la mémoire du Lieutenant Jacques Charlot, d 1915)
• Fugue (à la mémoire du Sous-Lieutenant Jean Cruppi, d 3 March 1915)
• Forlane (à la mémoire du Lieutenant Gabriel Deluc, d 15 September 1916)
• Rigaudon (à la mémoire de Pierre et Pascal Gaudin, d 12 November 1914)
• Menuet (à la mémoire de Jean Dreyfus, d 1917)
• Toccata (à la mémoire du Capitaine Joseph de Marliave, d 24 August 1914)

 

London