DESTOUCHES, André Cardinal 1672-1743

Issé, Pastorale Heroïque, Représentée Devant Sa Majesté à Trianon, le 17. Decembre 1697. Par L'Academie Royale de Musique; Mise en Musique par Monsieur Destouches, Sur-Intendant de la Musique du Roy, & Inspecteur general de son academie de Musique. Partiton. Generale. [Full score]

Paris: L'Imprimerie De Jean-Baptiste-Christophe Ballard, Seul Imprimeur du Roy pour la Musique, & Noteur de la Chapelle de Sa Majesté. ... Avec Privilege Du Roy, 1724.

Folio (37.5 x 24.5 cms). Full modern dark brown leather with raised bands on spine, red speckled edges. 1f. (blank), 1f. (recto half-title, verso printer's note), 1f. (recto title. verso blank), [5] (dedication to the King dated 17. December 1697), [6] ("Airs a Jouer"), [7] ("Airs a Chanter"), [8] (cast list), 300 pp., 1f. (blank).

With fine large woodcut device to title incorporating figures playing musical instruments; fine woodcut head- and tailpieces; occasional decorative woodcut initials.

Binding slightly worn, rubbed, and bumped; minor wear and browning to pastedowns; free endpapers lacking. Minor internal wear; first leaf partially detached and browned and stained at margins; light uniform browning; minor foxing; browning and foxing slightly heavier to margins of last several leaves. A very good copy overall, crisp and wide-margined.

Third edition of the work first published in 1697, with a second, heavily revised, edition published in 1708. BUC p. 268. Hirsch II, 196. Lesure p. 168. Sonneck p. 42. RISM D1832.

Issé, in a prologue and three acts by Destouches to a libretto by Antoine Houdar de Lamotte, received its first concert performances at Fontainebleau on 7 October 1697 and at Versailles at the Trianon on 17 December 1697; its first stage performance was in Paris at the Opéra on 30 December 1697.

The work "was an immediate success and Destouches's future was secured. Louis XIV gave him 200 louis with the comment that ‘since Lully no music had given him so much pleasure’ (Titon du Tillet). ... Destouches and his librettists dealt with the conventional genres of their time in an original manner. Issé is a pastorale but has heroic characters; Le Carnaval et la Folie is one of the first examples of a lyric comedy in France; Les élémens, an opéra-ballet, is clearly a prototype for the later ballet-héroïque; and Les stratagèmes de l’Amour is perhaps the only ballet-héroïque with a comic intrigue, although we are assured that it is a ‘noble Comedy and one that has the character of Antiquity’ (libretto)." James R. Anthony in Grove Music Online

A "remarkable figure in French musical life during the first half of the 18th century. Destouches was of aristocratic stock, entitling him to entrée in circles usually closed to musicians. As a boy he was educated by the Jesuits and under their protection traveled to Siam (1687-8). Before becoming known as a composer and gaining acclaim as a musical administrator, Destouches served in the king's musketeers. He left the army in 1694 to pursue a career in music, studying for a time with Campra. He collaborated with his cousin, the librettist Antoine Houdar de la Mott, on a series of tragedies, of which the pastorale-héroïque Issé (1697) and Omphale (1701) were particularly successful. When the directorship of the Académie Royale de Musique became vacant in 1712 Destouches served in the interim, before being appointed inspecteur gènsmallèral in 1713. In 1728 he was finally made director." Sadie: Companion to Baroque Music , p. 117.

Item #39464

Price: $2,800.00  other currencies