__NOTOC__ Jean-Baptiste Forqueray (3 April 1699 – 28 June 1782), the son of Antoine Forqueray, was a player of the

viol The viola da gamba (), or viol, or informally gamba, is a bowed and fretted string instrument that is played (i.e. "on the leg"). It is distinct from the later violin family, violin, or ; and it is any one of the earlier viol family of bow (m ...

and a

composer A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. Etymology and def ...

. Forqueray was born in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

. He is most famous today for his 1747 publication of twenty-nine pieces for viol and continuo which he attributed to his father (except for three, for which he himself took credit). In the ''avertissement'' he states that he was responsible for the bass line (thus the figures as well) and the viol fingerings. Stylistically, they are very much influenced by Italian music and belong to the generation of

Jean-Marie Leclair Jean-Marie Leclair l'aîné (Jean-Marie Leclair the Elder) (10 May 1697 – 22 October 1764) was a French Baroque violinist and composer. He is considered to have founded the French violin school. His brothers, the lesser-known Jean-Marie ...

(1697–1764) and Jean-Pierre Guignon (1702–1774). Modern violists regard these '' Pieces de viole'' as the most virtuosic music for the instrument.

Paolo Pandolfo Paolo Pandolfo is an Italian virtuoso player, composer, and teacher of music for the viola da gamba, born on January 31, 1964. He began his studies as a double bass and guitar player, becoming a skilled performer of jazz and popular music.Ernesto ...

and Lorenz Duftschmid have both recorded the complete publication. Forqueray published the same pieces for

harpsichord A harpsichord is a musical instrument played by means of a musical keyboard, keyboard. Depressing a key raises its back end within the instrument, which in turn raises a mechanism with a small plectrum made from quill or plastic that plucks one ...

, possibly in arrangements made by his wife Marie-Rose, in 1749 (ed.

Colin Tilney Colin Graham Tilney (31 October 1933 – 17 December 2024) was a British-Canadian harpsichordist, fortepianist and teacher. He is well known for his historically-informed approach to performance practice, performing on original or copied ins ...

, Paris, 1970) but remarkably did not

transpose In linear algebra, the transpose of a Matrix (mathematics), matrix is an operator which flips a matrix over its diagonal; that is, it switches the row and column indices of the matrix by producing another matrix, often denoted by (among other ...

any of the music, so the melodies lie relatively low in the range of the harpsichord. Forqueray's pupils included

Louis XV Louis XV (15 February 1710 – 10 May 1774), known as Louis the Beloved (), was King of France from 1 September 1715 until his death in 1774. He succeeded his great-grandfather Louis XIV at the age of five. Until he reached maturity (then defi ...

's daughter Princesse Henriette-Anne and the future King

Frederick William II of Prussia Frederick William II (; 25 September 1744 – 16 November 1797) was King of Prussia from 1786 until his death in 1797. He was also the prince-elector of Brandenburg and (through the Orange-Nassau inheritance of his grandfather) sovereign princ ...

. Forqueray was married twice: to Jeanne Nolson (maternal aunt of Anne-Jeanne Boucon, wife of Jean Joseph Cassanea de Mondonville) on 29 July 1732 and, after her death, to the harpsichordist Marie-Rose Dubois on 13 March 1740 He died in Paris.

Issue

Forqueray had two children with Marie-Rose Dubois. * Jean-Baptiste Forqueray * Marie Forqueray

Selected recordings

''Pièces de clavecin,'' Michael Borgstede, clavecin. 2 CD Brilliant Classics 2008.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Forqueray, Jean-Baptise French male classical composers French Baroque viol players French male classical violinists French Baroque composers Musicians from Paris 1699 births 1782 deaths 18th-century classical composers 18th-century French composers 18th-century French violinists 18th-century French male musicians

Issue

Selected recordings

References

Further reading

External links