Folies d'Espagne and unedited music by Marin Marais

Marin Marais, now renowned among all lovers of music as one of the supreme masters of the Baroque period, was born in Paris in 1656. Despite his youth, the young Marin Marais, clearly gifted, was taken on at an early age as a pupil by Monsieur de Sainte-Colombe, the preeminent violist da gamba of the period; later he was accepted as a student by the celebrated composer, Jean-Baptiste Lully. Modern performers have reason to be grateful to Marais. Marais noted in his manuscripts the precise manner in which French Baroque music was played, much like his contemporaries such as Couperin or Hotteterre. His scores include carefully written out symbols and commentary that allow present-day musicians to recreate the noble style once intended for the ears of the Sun King himself. Marais, whose reputation and influence among his contemporaries extended to the courts of England and Germany, published five books of music for the viola da gamba between 1686 and 1725. In 1689 one contained a momentous "first," a score for a bass line to accompany a solo instrument. Until then, instruments such as viol, lute, or harpsichord had been regarded entirely as solo performers, played without any kind of accompaniment. With this publication, Marais initiated a new era in French performance practice. By the end of the 17th century, continuo instruments such as harpsichord, viol, and theorbo improvised or performed written-out bass lines for pieces that previously would have been played unaccompanied. One particularly clear example of the change can be found in a German manuscript of pieces by Dubuisson for solo viol that has a rudimentary bass line plainly added later. The new approach was often recorded in the visual arts of the period, as in the paintings of Watteau. Some time during the 1670s, while still studying with Sainte Colombe, Marais met another of his students, the Scottish nobleman Harie Maule. To Maule he presented 150 manuscript pieces. Maule took these pages home with him when he returned to Edinburgh. Records indicate their presence in Scotland before 1685, or in other words before Marais' first book was published. The 150 pieces are anything but simple sketches. About two-thirds of them appeared later in Marais' first three books, published successively in 1686, 1701, and 1711. Somehow however, about forty-five of them, as well as an original version of the celebrated Folies d'Espagne never came to light. Which brings us to the present recording. We have selected from among the 45 neglected pieces, arranged them as two suites, grouped them by tonality as Marais typically did in his published music, and included with them the early version of the Folies d'Espagne. The figured bass parts in the original Scottish manuscript were either missing, according to the tastes of an earlier period, or lost. We have therefore recreated them to correspond to performance practice of the time. * In the preface to the 1689 edition of bass parts for his first book, Marais states "When I gave the public my book for one and two viols I of course intended to add the figured bass, as it is absolutely essential." Then in his third, 1711, book, he remarks, "I would like to inform the public that most of the pieces in this book can be performed on a wide variety of instruments, whether organ, harpsichord, violin, treble viol, theorbo, flute or oboe. One must only be careful to select pieces in harmony with specific instruments." Accordingly, we have chosen to adapt a few pieces for different instruments: harpsichord (track x). or the theorbo (track x), and to use the same instruments as well as a baroque guitar as a base for accompaniments. The Suite in d minor opens with a magnificent Prelude pour la Violle et le Théorbe (track x). The title is ambiguous and allows two different interpretations: it can be taken as a prelude for viol accompanied by theorbo or, alternatively, as was suggested by Wieland Kuijken, as a prelude for the theorbo (track x). This recording includes both. It is immediately apparent from their scores that when Marais composed these pieces he was still under Sainte-Colombe's direct influence. The music, written by a young musician, requires bowing that was typical of his teacher, very quick notes played in separate bow strokes which Sainte-Colombe's copyist named "furies." "Furies" characterize the double of the courante in d minor (track x), the double of the allemande in a minor(track x), and the double of the Sarabande in d minor (track x ), as well as the twenty-second variation of the Folies (track x) written almost entirely in thirty-second notes played with separate bow strokes. In his 1732 publication Vies des musiciens et autres Jouers d'Instruments du regne du Louis le Grand, Evrard du Tillet writes, "Sainte Colombe was of course Marais' teacher, but when he realized after six months that his pupil could surpass him, he told him that he had nothing more to show him. Marais loved the viol passionately, so despite this final edict of Sainte Colombe, he resolved to learn more from his master and to perfect his skill on his instrument. Since he had some entry into the house, Marais took the time in summer to steal into Sainte Colombe's garden where his master habitually shut himself up in a little wooden cabinet he had built between the branches of a mulberry tree. There Sainte Colombe could play the viol without distraction and more beautifully. Marais slipped under the cabin where he could hear Sainte Colombe and profit from his approach to certain passages and bow strokes that masters of the art like to keep to themselves." There is a certain piquancy in this image of Marais spying on his elder. In time Marais would employ the diabolical bow strokes he had overheard in his early manuscript. However, by the time his first two books were published he used them less, and in his third book they have vanished entirely. In homage to Marais' master this recording have arranged the Petit Prélude (track x) for two "equal viols" (as Saint Colombe referred to them in his famous manuscript). The Plainte in d minor (track x) can be seen as the first stirrings of the tombeau form that became so dear to Marais and that later appeared in his second, 1701, book as Tombeaux for Sainte Colombe and Lully. Far from being a simple sketch, the Plainte includes sophisticated long phrases resembling heartfelt sighs, pain, and other instances of what Jean de la Fontaine, named "tenebrous pleasures for a melancholy heart." It is instructive to compare the unedited version of the Folia (track x) with Marais' published version. In the earlier version there are twelve new variations that for reasons we do not know for certain Marais chose subsequently not to publish. It may be that their extreme technical difficulty which would have been too advanced for the amateur musicians who were the principal buyers of Marais' books of music, would have made the books less saleable. It is certainly suggestive that Marais tells us in his third, 1711, book that "The large number of short and easy pieces I have included is proof that I wanted to satisfy the present circumstances which have been so often reiterated since the publication of my second book." This seems to show why Marais would have left difficult variations, however beautiful, out of his published work. In any case, the older version is presented on this recording. The manuscript version is closer to a sarabande, the original dance form on which the Folia is based. The first and second beats of the first variation are equally accented. Until the seventh variation there is no major difference between this version and the subsequent one published in 1701. Then, after the seventh variation, the published and unpublished versions are very much alike, with the exception that the 12 unedited variations appear here and there in between the published, and therefore more familiar variations. To end the Folia Marais has created his slowest and most sensual variations, so that we are left with the impression of a lover's fading sigh. Our most pressing wish in making this recording is to add to the public's knowledge and appreciation of the genius of Marin Marais, only twenty when he wrote this music, but already masterful. *recreation of the basso-continuo (suites en d minor (tracks x ­x) and a minor (tracks x ­x)) ­ Barnabé Janin Jonathan Dunford Paris, July 2000

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