Pierre Février

Pierre Février (21 March 1696 – 5 November 1760) was a French baroque composer, organist and harpsichordist.^[1]

Biography

Born in Abbeville in 1696, he arrived in Paris in 1720 and served as titular organist of two churches on Saint-Honoré street: the Jacobins' church (destroyed at the Revolution) and Saint-Roch (still standing). Claude-Bénigne Balbastre, who moved to Paris in 1750, was among his pupils and eventually succeeded Février at Saint-Roch.^[2] Pierre Février died in Paris on 5 November 1760.

Works

Two volumes of his harpsichord pieces are extant. The first one is dated 1734 and contains five suites:

• Suite in A major
  • Allemande la Magnanime
  • Le Concert des Dieux - Double du concert
  • La Délectable
  • Le Berceau
  • La Boufonne ou la Paysanne
• Suite in D minor
  • Fugue
  • Courante
  • Les Plaisirs des Sens
  • Le Labyrinthe
  • Ariette et doubles
• Suite in B minor
  • Fugue
  • L'Intrépide
  • La Grotesque
• Suite in D major
  • Gavotte et doubles
  • Le Brinborion
  • Le Tendre Language
  • Tambourin
• Suite (Festes de Campagne) in C major
  • Entrée
  • Musette
  • 2 Menuets
  • Le Gros Colas et la Grosse Jeanne
  • Les Petites Bergères

The second volume, composed after 1734 and before 1737, was discovered in the late 1990s in a private collection in Belgium (Arenberg). It contains two harpsichord suites that follow a similar pattern, mixing dances and descriptive pièces de caractère in the typical late Baroque French tradition:

• 1st Suite in G Minor
  • Les Liens Harmoniques - Rondeau
  • La Caressante - Rondeau
  • La Fertillante
  • La petite Coquette
  • Tambourin - Rondeau
• 2nd Suite in C Minor
  • Allemande
  • Les Tendres Tourterelles - Rondeau
  • Les Croisades - Rondeau
  • Menuet

See also

• French baroque harpsichordists