Baroque Era
1671
English buccaneer Henry Morgan destroys Panama City • King Louis XIV (Fr) acts to isolate his Dutch opponents, signing treaties with German states of Brunswick, Hanover, Luneburg and Osnabruck • Astronomer Giovanni Cassini (It) discovers satellites of the planet Saturn • Milton (Eng): Paradise Regained
1672
England and France are at war with Dutch Republic • France forms secret alliance with Sweden • French invade southern Holland • Dutch defeat an Anglo-French fleet in Sole Bay, off Suffolk coast (Eng) • Turks invade Poland • Thomas Shadwell (Eng): play Epsom Wells • Moliere (Fr): comedy Les Femmes savantes) • Jan Vermeer – The Guitar Player
1573
Dutch fleet defeats English and French fleets at Schoo-neveld Banks, in mouth of Scheldt River • English seize St Helena from Dutch; Dutch capture New York City from English • Brandenburg makes separate peace with France • Edmund Halley enters Queen's College at Oxford, as an undergraduate
1674
Treaty of Westminster ends Third Anglo-Dutch War; Dutch return New York City to English • Holy Roman Empire and Spain declare war on France • Anatomist Thomas Willis (Eng) publishes Pharmaceutice Rationalis • Philosopher Nicolas Malebranche (Fr): De la recherche de la verite (Search After Truth) • Racine (Fr) writes tragedy Iphigenie
1675
France, Army of German state of Brandenburg defeats the Swedes at Battle of Fehrbellin; German troops defeat French at Sasbach, Baden • King Christian V (Den) makes war on Sweden and regains Scania • Greenwich Royal Observatory is founded in England • Benedict de Spinoza (Neth) finishes Ethics
Giovanni Cassini
1671
Mauricio Cazatti resigns from his post as musical director at San Petronio, Bologna (possibly due to infighting). He finds employment in Mantua as director of chamber music to Duchess Isabella Gonzaga.
Heinrich Schutz, 86 years old, completes his Schwanengesang. His final musical collection comprises 13 motets for double choir with continuo: Psalm 119 (in 11 motets), Psalm 100, and a Magnificat Canticle.
Psalm 100 - Heinrich Schütz
Heinrich Schütz - "Magnificat"
3 March
Robert Cambert and librettist Pierre Perrin stage Pomone with the newly created Academie Royale de Musique, in Paris. The production is spectacularly successful, achieving around 140 performances. Pomone is generally regarded as the first true French opera.
Cambert - Pomone
1. Prologue - Overture 0:00
2. La Nymphe de la seine 3:02
3. ACTE 1 - Second Overture 7:43
4. Passons nos jours dans ces vergers 9:24
5. Recitativo (Flore) 13:23
6. Le dieu des jardins 15:25
7. Recitativo (Faune) 16:31
8. Jardinier puis les trois jardiniers ensemble 17:29
9. Entrée des bouviers 19:58
10. Faune, le dieu des Jardins 20:38
11. Air (Faune) 21:50
12. Ritournelle 23:25
13. ACTE 2 - Air (Beroe) 26:33
14. Air (Vertumne) 28:12
15. Air (Beroe) 29:36
16. Que voyez-vous, mes yeux 30:25
17. Recitativo (Beroe) 31:33
17. Intermède 32:02
January
Exiled Queen Christina of Sweden opens Rome’s first public opera house, the Teatro Tor di Nona. Francesco Cavalli’s Scipione affricano (1664) is the inaugurating opera, furnished with a new prologue by Alessandro Stradella.
Francesco Cavalli - Scipione affricano
17 January
Jean-Baptiste Lully collaborates with Moliere, Quinault and Pierre Corneille to produce Psyche, a tragedie-ballet, at the Tuileries Palace. Unique of its kind, the work will serve as a model for Lully’s first operatic collaboration with Quinault two years later.
Jean-Baptiste Lully - Psyche - Prologue
Jean Baptiste Lully - Psyche - Ouverture
Jean-Baptiste Lully: Psyché - Prelude pour scene dernier
June
Perrin’s business partners pilfer the proceeds from Pomone and land the librettist in jail for unpaid debt. Robert Cambert, out of pocket, looks for a new collaborator.
8 June
Italian composer and violinist Tomaso Albinoni is born in Venice.
16 June
Johann Christoph Bach, German composer, born.
September
Antoine Forqueray, French composer, born.
3 November
Dresden-based Italian composers Giovanni Andrea Bontempi and Marco Giuseppe Peranda produce the German opera Daphne, based on the translation of Rinuccini’s Dafne by Martin Opitz.
Johann Christoph Bach
Johann Christoph Bach (16 June 1671 – 22 February 1721) was a musician of the Bach family. He was the eldest of the brothers of Johann Sebastian Bach who survived childhood.
Johann Christoph was born in Erfurt in June 1671, a few months before the family moved to Eisenach, where Johann Sebastian was born fourteen years later as the last child. In 1686 Johann Christoph was sent to Erfurt to study under Johann Pachelbel for the next three years. By the end of his apprenticeship he was organist in the St. Thomas church in that town for a short time, followed by some months at Arnstadt where several Bach relatives lived.
In 1690 Johann Christoph became organist at the Michaeliskirche at Ohrdruf. In October 1694 he married Dorothea von Hof. His mother Maria Elisabeth Lämmerhirt had died earlier that year, and his father Johann Ambrosius Bach died in March the next year. Two younger brothers, Johann Jacob and Johann Sebastian, who up till then had been living with their father in Eisenach, came to live with Johann Christoph's family in Ohrdruf.
At the time, Johann Jacob was thirteen, and Johann Sebastian not even ten. Johann Christoph's five sons were born between 1695 and 1713. Johann Christoph became his youngest brother's keyboard teacher, or, at least, Johann Sebastian "laid the foundations of his keyboard technique" under the guidance of his eldest brother.
Having stayed with his brother for five years Johann Sebastian left Ohrdruf, joining the choir of St. Michael's Convent at Lüneburg. Around the time Johann Sebastian left Lüneburg a few years later he composed a Cappricio for his eldest brother, BWV 993. In the years that followed Johann Christoph copied several compositions by his younger brother.
All of Johann Christoph's sons became musicians, three of them at Ohrdruf. He died, aged 49, in Ohrdruf.
Antoine Forqueray
Antoine Forqueray (September 1671 – 28 June 1745) was a French composer and virtuoso of the viola da gamba.
Forqueray, born in Paris, was the first in a line of composers which included his brother Michel (1681–1757) and his sons Jean-Baptiste (1699–1782) and Nicolas Gilles (1703–1761).
Forqueray's exceptional talents as a player led to his performing before Louis XIV at the age of ten. The king was so pleased with him that he arranged for Forqueray to have music lessons at his own expense and then, seven years later, in 1689, named him musicien ordinaire of La chambre du Roy a position Forqueray held until the end of his life. To supplement his official income he gave lucrative private lessons to members of the royal family and the aristocracy. In Louis XIV's later years the normal routine of concerts at the court of Versailles was augmented by Mme de Maintenon. She arranged almost daily performances in her apartments by such musicians as Robert de Visée (guitar), René Descoteaux (flute), Jean-Baptise Buterne (harpsichord) as well as Forqueray.
Antoine Forqueray - Harpsichord Works
1. Suite No. 1 in D minor 0:00
2. Suite No. 2 in G major 24:42
3. Suite No. 3 in D major 47:16
Antoine Forqueray - Harpsichord Works
1. La Superbe, ou La Forqueray (F. Couperin) 0:00
2. Allemande, La LaBorde 4:35
3. La Forqueray 9:17
4. La Cottin 12:06
5. La Bellmont 15:06
6. La Portugaise 18:46
7. La Couperin 21:36
8. La Marella 25:24
9. Sarabande, La D'Aubonne 28:57
10. La Bournoville 33:44
11. La Sainscy 37:00
12. La Buisson, Chaconne 40:18
13. La Montigny 45:37
14. La Sylva 51:41
15. La Forqueray (J. Duphly) 56:18
1672
Jacques Champion Chambonnieres dies in Paris, aged about 71.
February
Antonio Sartorio's opera L'Adelaide opens at the Teatro San Salvatore in Venice.
Antonio Sartorio - L'Adelaide - aria
Having fallen out with Jean-Baptiste Lully, Moliere begins a collaborative partnership with the composer Marc-Antoine Charpentier. They quickly produce new versions of Moliere's comedies-ballets, including Le mariage force.
Jean-Baptiste Lully - Bourée du Mariage Forcé
March
Jean-Baptiste Lully buys the privilege (licence) of the Paris Opera from Pierre Perrin, who is at this time in debtors’ prison. Now with a monopoly over the staging of opera in France, Lully swiftly closes down Robert Cambert's second opera, Les peines et les plaisirs de I’amour, currently playing at the Jeu de Paume de la Bouteille (a converted tennis court) in Paris.
English violinist and composer John Banister begins a series of fee-paying public concerts—possibly the first of their kind—at his house in Whitefriars. Advertising them in the London Gazette, the concerts are held daily at 4pm with tickets priced at one shilling.
André Cardinal Destouches, French composer, born.
6 November
Heinrich Schutz, the most significant German composer of the 17th century, dies in Dresden, aged 87.
Carlo Pallavicino replaces him as Kapellmeister to the Elector of Saxony.
Nicolas de Grigny, French organist and composer, born.
22 December
Juan Hidalgo and Juan Velez de Guevara present Los celos hacen estrellas (Jealousy Produces Stars), one of the earliest surviving zarzuelas, at the Alcazar Palace in Madrid.
André Cardinal Destouches
André Cardinal Destouches, original name André Cardinal, (baptized April 6, 1672, Paris, France—died Feb. 7, 1749, Paris), French opera and ballet composer of the period between Jean-Baptiste Lully and Jean-Philippe Rameau.
André Cardinal was the son of a wealthy Parisian merchant, Etienne Cardinal, Seigneur des Touches et de Guilleville, but he did not take any form of the patronym until 1694, after which he was known as Destouches. He was educated by the Jesuits and traveled with a priest to Siam (Thailand) in 1687–88. Four years later he participated in the siege of Namur as a musketeer, but he left military service in 1694 to pursue a career in music. Destouches’ first opera, Issé, was produced in 1697. He wrote 10 other major stage works (including some ballets), and in 1713 he was appointed inspector general of the Royal Academy of Music (i.e., the Paris Opéra). In 1728 he became director of that institution, though he abandoned the post two years later. Destouches also wrote two cantatas and several motets.
Destouches: «Le Carnaval et la Folie» Comédie-ballet
1. Act I 0:01
2. Act II 24:11
3. Act III 47:07
4. Act IV 1:16:10
André Cardinal Destouches - Les Eléments
1. Ouverture
2. Menuet I & II 3:17
3. Marche et Menuet I 6:07
4. Air pour les heures et les zephyrs 8:52
5. Passepied 9:45
6. Air I pour les néréides 11:27
7. Air II 13:01
8. Chaconne 14:26
Destouches : Issé
Nicolas de Grigny
Nicolas de Grigny, (baptized Sept. 8, 1672, Reims, France—died Nov. 30, 1703, Reims), French organist and composer, member of a family of musicians in Reims.
Grigny was organist (1693–95) at the abbey church of Saint-Denis in Paris. By 1696 he had returned to Reims and shortly thereafter was appointed organist at the cathedral there, a post he held until his death. His organ music is distinguished for its rich texture, complex counterpoint, and expressive melody and for its free exploitation of the contrasting colours of the instrument. His volume Premier livre d’orgue (1699; “First Book of the Organ”) sums up the work of his predecessors and stands with that of François Couperin at the apex of the French classical organ tradition. J.S. Bach so admired it that he transcribed the entire volume for his own use.
Nicolas de Grigny. Livre d'orgue (1699) la messe.
Nicolas De Grigny: Ave Maris Stella
Nicolas de Grigny - Gloria della Messa
1673
Dietrich Buxtehude establishes the Advent concert series of Abendmusiken (Evening Music) at Lubeck, following the tradition of Abendspielen by his predecessor, Franz Tunder.
Abendmusik - Buxtehude & Tunder
Matthew Locke publishes Melothesia, a treatise on music theory containing many examples of his own keyboard pieces, presented as suites. Also included are the earliest surviving printed rules for thoroughbass in English.
Matthew Locke - Melothesia Suite II in sol min
The 20-year-old Johann Pachelbel arrives in Vienna and becomes deputy organist at the Stephansdom (St Stephen’s Cathedral).
Panoramic view of Vienna after the city walls were reconstructed in 1548. In the middle is St Stephen's Cathedral, behind the medieval Hofburg complex.
Thomas Clayton, English violinist and composer, born.
Jakob Greber, German composer, born.
February
Le malade imaginaire (The Imaginary Invalid), a comedie-ballet by Marc-Antoine Charpentier and Moliere, opens at the Palais Royal, Paris. Moliere takes the title role of a hypochondriac, but during the fourth performance, in an unfortunate moment of irony, collapses on stage and dies a few hours later.
Moliere
27 April
Jean-Baptiste Lully and Philippe Quinault present in a prologue and five acts Cadmus et Hermione, their first tragedie lyrique, at the Jeu de Paurne de Bequet (Bel-Air tennis court), Paris. Thereafter Louis XIV authorises Lully to transfer his productions to the Palais Royal, ousting Moliere's former company. Lully secures his public stage music monopoly in France by restricting rival opera companies to six instrumentalists and two singers, and banning them from employing dancers.
Lully - Le Poème Harmonique - Cadmus et Hermione
J.B.Lully - Cadmus & Hermione - Prologue
"Belle Hermione" (Cadmus et Hermione) - J.B.Lully
"Finale" (Cadmus et Hermione) - J.B.Lully
1 February
Alessandro Marcello, Italian musician, born.
June
His voice now broken, the 13-year-old Henry Purcell leaves the Chapel Royal and becomes an assistant to the organist and composer John Hingston, repairer and tuner of the king’s wind and keyboard instruments.
Alessandro Marcello
Alessandro Ignazio Marcello (1 February 1673 in Venice – 19 June 1747 in Venice) was an Italian nobleman and musician.
A contemporary of Tomaso Albinoni, Marcello was the son of a senator in Venice. As such, he enjoyed a comfortable life that gave him the scope to pursue his interest in music. He held concerts in his hometown and also composed and published several sets of concertos, including six concertos under the title of La Cetra (The Lyre), as well as cantatas, arias, canzonets, and violin sonatas. Marcello, being a slightly older contemporary of Antonio Vivaldi, often composed under the pseudonym Eterio Stinfalico, his name as a member of the celebrated Arcadian Academy (Pontificia Accademia degli Arcadi). He died in Padua in 1747.
Although his works are infrequently performed today, Marcello is regarded as a very competent composer.
The Concerto for Oboe and Strings in D minor op. 1 is perhaps his best-known work.
Alessandro Marcello - Concerto per Oboe, Archi e Basso Continuo in re minore, SF 935 - Op.1
Alessandro Marcello - 6 Concerti "La creta" - Oboe Concertos
Alessandro Marcello - Concertos & Cantatas
Alessandro Marcello - Adagio in D Minor
Thomas Clayton
His father was William Clayton. He studied in Italy, from about 1702 to about 1704.
In association with Nicola Haym and Charles Dieupart, Clayton entered upon a series of opera performances at Drury Lane Theatre — the first venture of the kind in the annals of the English stage. The first season began on Tuesday, 16 Jan. 1705, with Arsinoe, Queen of Cyprus, the work which Clayton had vamped up from his Italian gleanings. It was announced as 'a new opera, after the Italian manner, all sung,' with recitatives instead of spoken dialogue. On 6 February 1705, it was played at St. James's Palace before Queen Anne, at the celebration of her birthday ; according to Genest it was performed fifteen, or according to Burney twenty-four times in 1705, and thirteen times in 1706.
Encouraged by this success, Clayton tried his hand at another opera, and on Tuesday, 4 March 1707, produced at Drury Lane a setting of Addison's Rosamond, in which Holcomb, Leveridge, Hughes, Mrs. Tofts, Mrs. Lindsay, and Maria Gallia sang the principal parts. This work was repeated on the 15th and 22nd of the same month, but its failure was so decided that it was never again performed.
After the failure of 'Rosamond' the operatic venture continued until 1711. On 24 May 1711, settings by Clayton of a version of Dryden's Alexander's Feast (altered by John Hughes), and of Harrison's Passion of Sappho, were performed, but both works failed, after which nothing is heard of the luckless composer.
He is said to have died about 1730.
Jakob Greber
Johann Jakob Greber (ca. 1673 – buried 5 July 1731) was a German Baroque composer and musician.
Greber's date and place of birth are unknown, although the Neue Deutsche Biographie proposes an approximate date of 1673. He is presumed to have studied in Italy and arrived in London from there in 1702, accompanied by his mistress, the opera singer Margherita de L'Epine. He was to remain in London for the next three years composing incidental music for plays and arias for L'Epine. In 1703, Greber composed the incidental music for the premiere of Nicholas Rowe's play The Fair Penitent, including four arias sung by L'Epine during the interlude. It was during this time that Rowe dubbed L'Epine "Greber's Peg", a name by which she was known for several years.
On 9 April 1705, the Queen's Theatre in London was officially opened with Greber's opera Gli amori di Ergasto (The Loves of Ergasto). It was the first opera sung entirely in Italian by Italian singers to be performed in London.
The printed libretto also contained an English translation by Peter Anthony Motteux. Shortly after the premiere of Gli amori di Ergasto, Greber left London.
In 1723, after Charles Philip moved his court to Mannheim, Johann von Wilderer was appointed to serve jointly with Greber as Kapellmeister. Wilderer died in 1724. Greber lived on for another seven years, dying in Mannheim in July 1731.
Jakob Greber - "Tu parti idolo mio"
1674
The Theatre Royal in London's Drury Lane opens.
Theatre Royal Drury Lane 1812
The Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, commonly known as Drury Lane is a West End theatre and Grade I listed building in Covent Garden, London, England. The building faces Catherine Street (earlier named Bridges or Brydges Street) and backs onto Drury Lane. The building is the most recent in a line of four theatres which were built at the same location, the earliest of which dated back to 1663, making it the oldest theatre site in London still in use. According to the author Peter Thomson, for its first two centuries, Drury Lane could "reasonably have claimed to be London's leading theatre". For most of that time, it was one of a handful of patent theatres, granted monopoly rights to the production of "legitimate" drama in London (meaning spoken plays, rather than opera, dance, concerts, or plays with music).
The first theatre on the site was built at the behest of Thomas Killigrew in the early 1660s, when theatres were allowed to reopen during the English Restoration. Initially known as "Theatre Royal in Bridges Street", the theatre's proprietors hired a number of prominent actors who performed at the theatre on a regular basis, including Nell Gwyn and Charles Hart. In 1672 the theatre caught fire and Killigrew built a larger theatre on the same plot, renamed the "Theatre Royal in Drury Lane"; it opened in 1674. This building lasted nearly 120 years, under the leaderships of Colley Cibber, David Garrick and Richard Brinsley Sheridan, the last of whom employed Joseph Grimaldi as the theatre's resident Clown.
English composer Jeremiah Clarke is born around this time.
12 January
Opera composer Reinhard Keiser is baptised near Weissenfels, Germany.
12 January
Giacomo Carissimi, leading Italian composer of sacred music, dies in Rome, aged 68.
19 January
Jean-Baptiste Lully’s five-act Alceste is premiered by the Paris Opera at the Palais Royal, with the printed libretto available for purchase at the door. While successful, the production is criticised by a highly vocal minority, angry at the composers dictatorial monopoly over French opera.
Jean-Baptiste Lully - Orchestral Suite from 'Alceste'
Lully: Alceste - Prologue
Lully "Alceste"
The poet Thomas Shadwell produces a musical version of Shakespeare's The Tempest based on an adaptation by Davenant and Dryden. Staged at Londons Dorset Garden Theatre, the semi-opera (containing spoken words) incorporates music by six composers including Pelham Humfrey, Matthew Locke, Giovanni Battista Draghi and John Banister.
14 July
English composer Pelham Humfrey dies in Windsor, aged 26, after several months of weakening health.
Johann Augustin Kobelius, German composer, born.
August
Alessandro Stradella's serenata Vola, vola in altri petti is performed in Rome before Christina of Sweden. The work is one of the earliest to incorporate concerto grosso instrumentation.
Jeremiah Clarke
Jeremiah Clarke (c. 1674 – 1 December 1707) was an English baroque composer and organist, best known for his Trumpet Voluntary.
Thought to have been born in London around 1674, Clarke was one of the pupils of John Blow at St Paul's Cathedral and a chorister in 1685 at the Chapel Royal. Between 1692 and 1695 he was an organist at Winchester College, then between 1699 and 1704 he was an organist at St Paul's Cathedral. He later became an organist and 'Gentleman extraordinary' at the Chapel Royal, he shared that post with William Croft, his friend.
Clarke is best remembered for a popular keyboard piece: the Prince of Denmark's March, which is commonly called the Trumpet Voluntary, written in about 1700.
"A violent and hopeless passion for a very beautiful lady of a rank superior to his own" caused Clarke to commit suicide.
Suicides were not generally granted burial in consecrated ground, but an exception was made for Clarke, who was buried in the crypt of St Paul's Cathedral.
Jeremiah Clarke: Trumpet Voluntary "Prince of Denmark's March"
Reinhard Keiser
Reinhard Keiser, (born Jan. 9, 1674, Teuchern, near Weissenfels, Saxony [Germany]—died Sept. 12, 1739, Hamburg), leading early composer of German opera. His works bridged the Baroque style of the late 17th century and the Rococo style galant of the early 18th century.
Keiser attended the Thomas School in Leipzig and about 1697 settled in Hamburg. His nearly 70 operas, which span the period 1694 to 1734, include Octavia (1705); Der angenehme Betrug, with arias by Christoph Graupner (1707, revived 1931; “The Pleasant Deception”); Croesus (c. 1711; revised 1730); and the comic opera Der lächerliche Printz Jodelet (1726; “The Laughable Prince Jodelet”).
With his colleagues Johann Mattheson and G.P. Telemann, Keiser attempted to establish a distinctively German form of Baroque opera. His early stage works were entirely in German, but Italian arias crept into his later operas under the influence of the increasingly popular Neapolitan school. In his last, Circe (1734), there were 21 German arias and 23 Italian arias, some written by Leonardo Leo, Johann Adolf Hasse, and George Frideric Handel. Keiser’s works show French influence in their ballet scenes. Unlike the Neapolitan operas, but like those of the earlier Venetian style, they show much flexibility in the treatment of the aria and a great concern for the close relationship between music and text.
Keiser held his dominant position until the onslaught of the more stereotyped Neapolitan opera was too strong. He became cantor and canon of the Hamburg cathedral in 1728 and saw, in 1738, the closing of the Hamburg opera. In his later years he turned to church music written in a more severe style, including motets, cantatas, and operatic oratorios. His style influenced both Johann Sebastian Bach and especially Handel, who borrowed extensively from his works.
Reinhard Keiser - Passion music
Reinhard Keiser - Der blutige und sterbende Jesus
Keiser: Suite from "Hercules und Hebe"
Reinhard Keiser: Laudate Pueri
Johann Augustin Kobelius
Johann Augustin Kobelius (21 February 1674 – 17 August 1731) was a German Baroque composer and Kapellmeister at the court of Saxe-Weissenfels.
Kobelius was born in Wählitz near Hohenmölsen, the son of August Kobelius, a pastor from Landshut in Bavaria. His first music teacher was his maternal grandfather, who worked in Weissenfels as an organist. He later studied with Johann Christian Schieferdecker and Johann Philipp Krieger, then Kapellmeister at the Weissenfels court. Eventually, Kobelius travels took him until Venice."In 1702 the reigning Duke of Saxe-Weissenfels secured Kobelius' appointment as organist at St. Jacobi in Sangerhausen, overruling the town's choice of J. S. Bach."
This was probably the only occasion in Bach's career that an upheld application on his part resulted in failure. From 1703 Kobelius also worked as municipal choirmaster.
Since 1725, the position of Landrentmeister (chamberlain) placed him well above the status of Hofkapellmeister. "Kobelius was the last important composer to write operas during the brief but brilliant period of music at the Weissenfels court." Instead of the court conductor Johann Philipp Krieger from 1715 to 1729 Kobelius "served as the only regular composer of operas for performances in the royal palace, writing one score or more each year."
1675
Having settled in Venice, Giovanni Legrenzi produces his first operas for the city: La divisione del mondo and Eteocle e Polinice. Both works are introduced at the Teatro San Salvatore.
Sono amante – Scene and aria for Cintia in La Divisione del mondo - Legrenzi
Legrenzi - "Che fiero costume" - Eteocle E Polinice
11 January
Jean-Baptiste Lully presents Thesee (Theseus) at the palace of St Germain-en-Laye. With libretto by Quinault, the opera enjoys revivals well into the following century.
Jean Baptiste Lully - selection from Thésée
March
Marc-Antoine Charpentier provides incidental music for Thomas Corneille's play Circe at the Hotel de Guenegaud, Paris. The production proves extremely popular and aids the fortunes of Moliere’s old theatre company, Le Troupe du Roy (recently ejected from the Palais Royal by Jean-Baptiste Lully).
Matthew Locke and Giovanni Draghi collaborate on the music for Shadwell’s Psyche, lavishly staged at the Dorset Garden Theatre in London. The semiopera, based on Moliere’s Psyche of 1671, manages a run of around eight performances.
Matthew Locke: Music for 'The Tempest' 1674-1675
Matthew Locke: Incidental Music for 'The Tempest'
I. The First Musick: Introduction [00:00]
II. Galliard [00:58]
III. Gavot [02:41]
IV. The Second Musick: Saraband [04:16]
V. Lilk [07:26]
VI. Curtain Tune [08:22]
VII. The First Act Tune 'Rustick Air' [13:03]
VIII. The Second Act Tune 'Minoit' [14:22]
IX. The Third Act Tune 'Corant' [15:47]
X. The Fourth Act Tune 'A Martial Jigge' [16:44]
XI. The Conclusion 'A Canon 4 in 2' [18:05]
31 March
Alessandro Stradella's celebrated oratorio San Giovanni Battista (Saint John the Baptist) premieres in Rome. In this dramatic work the composer continues to pioneer concerto grosso scoring, with contrasts between small (concertino) and large (concerto grosso) instrumental groups.
Alessandro Stradella - San Giovanni Battista
29 October
Andreas Hammerschmidt, prominent German composer and organist, dies in Zittau, aged about 63.
Saint-Sulpice organist Guillaume-Gabriel Nivers issues his Troisieme livre d’orgue des huit tons de l’eglise.
G-G. Nivers : Suite du troisième ton complète - Premier livre d'orgue
Michel de la Barre, French composer, born.
Michel de la Barre
Michel de la Barre (c. 1675 – 15 March 1745) was a French composer and renowned flautist known as being the first person to publish solo flute music. He played at the Académie Royale de Musique, the Musettes and Hautbois de Poitou and the courts of Louis XIV and Louis XV.
Michel de La Barre - Suite à deux flûtes sans basse
M. de La Barre - Deuxième Suite de Pièces à deux flûtes traversières
Jan Vermeer – The Guitar Player