Recital Series: Ensemble Correspondances by Park Avenue Armory

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WELCOME Park Avenue Armory strives to engage audiences with eclectic, immersive, and thought-provoking works that are in direct dialogue with the Armory’s unconventional spaces to gain new sonic perspectives. Our celebrated Recital Series expands during the 2022 Season to include performances of classical and contemporary music not only in the intimate setting of the Board of Officers Room, but also in other spaces including the Wade Thompson Drill Hall. The Recital Series opens the season with performances by two notable ensembles performing repertoire from opposite ends of the musical spectrum. New music ensemble Alarm Will Sound take over the Drill Hall to perform Grammy and Pulitzer Prizewinning composer John Luther Adams’ Ten Thousand Birds, walking through the space as they play while the audience follows. A major force in the 17th-century French repertory Ensemble Correspondances under the direction of founder Sébastien Daucé presents Plaisirs du Louvre, music from the Chamber of Louis XIII including works by Couperin, Boësset, de Chancy, and others performed on period instruments. Celebrated baritone Justin Austin comes to the Board of Officers Room for an intimate program with pianist Howard Watkins, featuring art songs by Ricky Ian Gordon set to the poems of Langston Hughes as well as works by American composers Aaron Copland, Leonard Bernstein, Kurt Weill, Damien Sneed, and more. And after appearing on some of the world’s most important opera stages, soprano Ying Fang comes to the austerely elegant space with pianist Ken Noda to showcase her unique sensibility and operatic range. We are proud to continue our tradition of fostering rising talent by hosting the North American solo recital debuts of tenor Michael Spyres and mezzo soprano Emily D’Angelo. One of the most sought-after tenors of his generation, Spyres showcases his brilliant artistry with a program of Rossini’s art songs and cantatas with pianist Mathieu Pordoy. D’Angelo partners with pianist Sophia Muñoz to perform works from her debut album enargeia (Deutsche Grammophon), including songs by Sarah Kirkland Snider, Missy Mazzoli, Hildegard von Bingen, and Hildur Guðnadóttir. This year’s lineup offers audiences even more chances to enjoy a beautiful range of chamber music experiences performed by artists with a highly distinctive international profile. I hope you join in my excitement for witnessing these magical moments in music. Rebecca Robertson Founding President and Executive Producer Pierre Audi Marina Kellen French Artistic Director

2022 RECITAL SERIES IN THE RESTORED VETERANS ROOM

LES PLAISIRS DU LOUVRE ENSEMBLE CORRESPONDANCES SÉBASTIEN DAUCÉ, CONDUCTOR tuesday, may

17, 2022 at 7:30pm

Before Versailles, the epicenter of power in the Kingdom of France was the Louvre, a genuine theater of ceremonies where music was duty-bound to impress with its magnificence. In the reign of Louis XIII, the air de cour and ballet mobilized elite composers such as Moulinié, Guédron, and de Chancy. The most famous of them, Boësset, guided the polyphonic air inherited from the Renaissance towards a more intimate conception: far from the sumptuous splendors to come in the shadow of the Sun King, this program is a rich array of delicately chiseled miniatures.

The Recital Series is supported in part by The Reed Foundation and the Howard & Sarah D. Solomon Foundation. Support for Park Avenue Armory’s artistic season has been generously provided by the Charina Endowment Fund, the Donald A. Pels Charitable Trust, The Harold and Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust, the Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation, the Howard Gilman Foundation, the Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation, The Shubert Foundation, The Emma and Georgina Bloomberg Foundation, the Marc Haas Foundation, the Leon Levy Foundation, the May and Samuel Rudin Family Foundation, Gregory Annenberg Weingarten, GRoW @ Annenberg, the Richenthal Foundation, and the Isak and Rose Weinman Foundation. Additional support has been provided by the Armory’s Artistic Council.

2022 SEASON SPONSORS

PROGRAM Louis Constantin Antoine Boësset François de Chancy Pierre Guedron Étienne Moulinié J. Champion de Chambonnières Antoine Boësset Étienne Moulinié

Le Ballet Royal de la Nuit, “Chasseurs I & II” Ballet des nymphes bocagères de la forêt sacrée “Reine que je sers et que je connais” (Concert de Diane et ses nymphes) “Dialogue de la troupe d’Orphée et des Hamadryades” Allemande en Ut à 5 “Cesse mortel d’importuner” (Juste mespris de saincte Agnez) “Quels tourments rigoureux” (Le Purgatoire) “Il sort de nos corps emplumés” (Concert de différents oyseaux) L’Entretien des Dieux “Ne vante point flambeau des Cieux” Première fantaisie à 4 “Rompez les charmes du sommeil” (Air de la Ridicule)

Intermission M. de la Voye Antoine Boësset Louis Constantin Antoine Boësset Louis Couperin Antoine Boësset Louis Constantin Antoine Boësset Louis Couperin Antoine Boësset François de Chancy

Prélude “Noires forêts, demeures sombres” Le Ballet Royal de la Nuit, “Danses du Sabbat” “Quelle merveilleuse aventure” “Je suis l’adorable Équité” (Récit de la Félicité, la Justice, et les Amours) “Ce roi vainqueur de nos malheurs” (Pour le Roy) Fantaisie pour les violes “Que prétendez-vous, mes désirs” Le Ballet Royal de la Nuit, “Folia” (maggiore et minore) “Segua chi vuol iniquo Amore” La Piémontoise “Conseille-moi mon coeur” (David disgrâcié) “Rares fleurs, vivantes peintures”

This performance is approximately 90 minutes including a 15-minute intermission.

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WHEN THE KING COMMANDS:

ROYAL MUSIC AND ENTERTAINMENTS IN THE TIME OF LOUIS XIII During the reign of Louis XIII (1610-43), the entertainments and festivities of the French court under the House of Bourbon owed much to the legacy of the previous French sovereigns under the House of Valois, who had raised art and magnificence to the status of political tools, but also to the influence of salon culture and leisured society pursuits, which had emerged during the preceding reign of Henri IV (1589-1610). If the invention of the ballet de cour at the end of the 16th century sought to link entertainment and political necessity, the establishment under Henri III (1574-89) of a genuine court ceremonial, which found its emblematic setting in the Louvre, had made it possible to integrate music into the king’s day in a more organic and symbolic fashion. Under the early Bourbons, the influence of salon culture gave the court a more galant atmosphere, to which the codes and elegant manners of a new civility in high society added the last touch of refinement. While laying the foundations of the future splendors of the Grand Siècle, the reign of Louis XIII itself represents the golden age of this galant culture, whose musical emblem, the air de cour, pervaded the whole of society and was heard in all the salons, galleries, and ruelles of the capital’s aristocratic residences, and especially the most symbolic of them: the Louvre. The air de cour at the time of Louis XIII The air de cour was a byproduct of the humanist debates of the late Renaissance and served as an ornament to royal ballets and divertissements, whose splendor it enhanced with large-scale récits (vocal solos) and dramatic or encomiastic choruses. Most such airs were short settings of refined galant poetry, the growing taste for which subsequently spread to literary, aristocratic, and bourgeois circles. With its subtle music capable of expressing all the nuances of the realm of love, the air de cour was one of the emblematic elements of a society where the honnête homme devoted himself to the art of pleasing his entourage (plaire) and expressing himself elegantly (bien dire) according to the codes of galant culture imposed by literary préciosité. The numerous collections published by Ballard, Imprimeur du Roi pour la musique (Printer of music to the King), were full of airs galants, paeans of praise, récits from the ballets danced at court, and saynètes (short dramatic sketches) in dialogue, but also airs à boire (drinking songs) or pieces of Italian or Spanish origin or showing the influence of those neighboring cultures with which the honnête homme was expected to be familiar. In the face of this formidable vogue, the air de cour became a target for the pious, who hastened to replace the amorous texts of fashionable airs with religious poetry more suitable for hymning the love of God.

Under Louis XIII, city and court influenced each other, bringing about changes in aspirations and practices. Just as Parisian society enjoyed singing the airs from the ballets danced by or before the King and Queen, the court in its turn yielded to the galant culture that flooded Parisian salons. The polyphonic air, which remained the prerogative of the Musique de la Chambre du Roi, was infiltrated by new trends. The rise of basso continuo and the domestic practice of singing with lute hastened the development of French accompanied monody. Depending on its intended recipients, its inspiration, and its texture, and thanks to the polymorphic character bestowed on it by different versions of the same pieces offered by Ballard’s publications, the air de cour offered a wide range of interpretative possibilities, in combinations that could be adapted at will to suit the circumstances or the available vocal and instrumental resources. The Musique de la Chambre du Roi At the same time as amateur music-making developed among the aristocracy, the Musique de la Chambre du Roi remained a professional elite, the heir to the polyphonic tradition of the Renaissance. It comprised a dozen adult male singers (chantres), two or three choirboys (enfants de la Musique), and a band of instrumentalists (playing recorders, lutes, viols, and keyboard instruments collectively referred to as épinettes, ‘spinets’), to which a few female voices might be unofficially added. The Musique de la Chambre du Roi was placed under the responsibility of a Surintendant, himself assisted by a Maître. Among other functions and prerogatives, the Surintendant had the charge of providing the vocal music for the many ballets in which the King, Queen, and the whole court were the dancers. Airs, récits, and choruses performed by the Musique de la Chambre, reinforced for the occasion by the members of the Chapelle and the Ecurie du Roi, alternated with danced entrées accompanied by the Vingt-quatre Violons (themselves led by their ‘roi’ François Richomme, then, from 1624 to 1656, by Louis Constantin), or purely instrumental interludes played by lutes and viols. The Queen also had her own Musique, the organization of which was more or less modeled on that of the Chambre du Roi. It was reserved primarily for the Queen Mother, and then passed to the reigning Queen. Several musicians belonged to both bodies, serving the sovereigns for alternating six month terms, respectively.

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Among the outstanding personalities gravitating in court musical circles, first mention must go to Pierre Guédron (c.1565-1620), Maître (1608) then Surintendant (1613) of the Musique de la Chambre du Roi, the first great architect of the air de cour, which he helped to make fashionable. His extensive oeuvre (nearly 200 airs) is evoked here through sacred parodies of two of his most famous airs, Cessez mortels de soupirer and Quel espoir de guérir, published in 1612/13. Although he was never actually a member of the Musique de la Chambre du Roi, Étienne Moulinié (1599-1676), a native of Languedoc who followed his brother Antoine to Paris after the latter became a chantre in the prestigious group, quickly made a name for himself in the capital’s elite circles with his airs de cour. Appointed Intendant de la Musique to the King’s brother, Gaston d’Orléans, in 1627, he left a large output of airs, published between 1624 and 1639, for voice and lute or for four and five voices. With a final book of Airs à 4 “avec la basse continue” published in 1668, he must be considered as one of the last representatives of the polyphonic tradition of the genre. Three representative examples of this rich corpus may be heard here: two airs originally from ballets (Il sort de nos corps emplumés and Rompez les charmes du sommeil) and published in 1625 and 1639 respectively, and an air galant (Ô doux sommeil) from the 1668 collection. As for François de Chançy (c.1600-56), who was in the service of Cardinal Richelieu before becoming Maître des Enfants (Master of the Choirboys) in the Musique de la Chambre du Roi between 1630 and 1635, his contemporaries placed him alongside Guédron, Moulinié, and Antoine Boësset (15871643), to whom this program chiefly pays homage. A native of Blois, Antoine Boësset was still a child when he entered the court of Henri IV, where he was able to rub shoulders with the leading musicians of the kingdom, among them Eustache du Caurroy and Claude le Jeune. But it was most likely from Guédron that he learned the secrets of an art that was to take him to the highest musical offices at court. His career took a decisive step forward in 1613 when Guédron, the new Surintendant de la Musique de la Chambre, offered him his daughter’s hand and endowed him with his own previous position as Maître de la Musique de la Chambre du Roi. From then on, the musical and social career of the so-called “Apollon de la France” progressed steadily. Four years later, in 1617, his appointment as Maître de la Musique de la Chambre de la Reine confirmed him as the guarantor of his father-in-law’s artistic legacy. In due time, Boësset succeeded in his turn to the highest musical position in the realm: when he became Surintendant de la Musique de la Chambre in 1623, it was his task to organize the official entertainments—such as the ballets danced by or in front of the sovereigns—and private concerts for Louis XIII and Anne of Austria, and to provide the vocal music required for their pleasure. At the head of the court’s musical elite, he moved very close to the seat of power through the intimate relationships he was able to establish 4

with the sovereigns and the links he maintained with his most influential contemporaries, in political and financial circles as well as artistic and scholarly milieux. A renowned musician, a sought-after singing master, but also a courtier, Boësset amassed a substantial fortune and held numerous honorary offices and functions at court that gained him the support of its most prestigious figures. His airs de cour and airs de ballet—nearly 250 published between 1606 and 1643—represent the peak not only of their composer’s art but also of the golden age of the polyphonic air, and more generally illustrate the evolution of the genre towards a lighter form for solo voice and continuo. These delicately chiseled miniatures reveal great understanding of the poetic text and a keen feeling for word-setting, melody, and counterpoint, underlined by a refined use of vocal scoring. Alongside entrées from royal ballets from the years 1635-36, themselves compiled in a large-scale “Concert” offered to Louis XIII for the feast of Saint Louis (25 August), the airs on this program are punctuated by pieces written for harpsichord by the King’s musicians (here arranged for viols). Jacques Champion de Chambonnières (c.1601-72), a member of the Musique de la Chambre du Roi and his father’s successor as épinette du Roi (1611), enjoyed a solid reputation at court and in Parisian circles from the 1630s on. He is regarded as the founder of the French harpsichord school, and it was he who introduced the three Couperin brothers to court, the eldest of whom, Louis (uncle of François “le Grand”), was to become violiste ordinaire (viol player in ordinary) of the Chambre du Roi at the beginning of Louis XIV’s reign. All the King’s musicians had to be ready to serve in all circumstances, to respond to the daily demands of court ceremonial and the imperatives of protocol, and to play for the sovereign’s official and private entertainments. Hence, logically enough, most of them lived close to the Louvre, in the Parisian parishes of Saint-Germain-l’Auxerrois or Saint-Eustache. The pleasures of the Louvre Although less vast, convenient, and comfortable at this period than other palaces, such as Fontainebleau or Saint-Germainen-Laye, the Louvre had become, since the reign of Henri III, the chief residence of the King, who spent part of every year there, chiefly the winter months. It was a key hub of the monarchy and of royal symbolism, the epicenter of power, where the important events in the life of the court naturally took place: a veritable ceremonial was developed within its walls, which was to reach its apogee under Louis XIV. In this theater of power, music was an object of entertainment as well as an instrument of magnificence and was performed in a setting at once public and intimate. For major events of a political dimension, the court moved to the hall of the Hôtel du Petit-Bourbon, situated between the Louvre and the Church of Saint-Germain-l’Auxerrois.

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However, the palace itself had two halls for entertainments, built under Henri II in the south-west wing (by Pierre Lescot) of what was to become the Cour Carrée. On the ground floor was the “Grande Salle” (now the Salle des Caryatides), measuring over 7,500 square feet with a ceiling height of 26 feet. This played host to the grand dynastic ballets, such as the Ballet de la Félicité, danced in 1639 to celebrate the long-awaited birth of the future Louis XIV—and the last royal ballet for which Boësset provided the récits (Je suis l’adorable Equité). Above all, it was there that, every year during Carnival, the court attended the Ballet du Roi, an allegorical spectacle in which the sovereign himself performed, “representing” the image of majesty in his dancing. This ceremonial hall was extended to the south by a raised platform known as the tribunal, decorated with columns and featuring an imposing triumphal arch composed of two richly worked porticoes joined by a barrel vault. It was in this space, a symbol of regal power, that the royal family was placed, as was the “haut-dais” under which the King would sit when he was not dancing. On the opposite side, under a richly sculpted gallery with standing space for a few musicians, a “théâtre” was set up, the point of departure for the dancers, who performed before the gaze of the court, placed in terraced seating around the sides of the hall. On the first floor of the palace, a slightly smaller and less official “Salle haute” was also used for divertissements, balls, ballets, and banquets of lesser political importance. It was usually here that Anne of Austria and the ladies of her household danced the Ballet de la Reine a few days after the Ballet du Roi. The royal apartments were also used for divertissements and for the moments in the sovereigns’ day that were accompanied by music. At the Louvre, Louis XIII occupied the apartment built in the reign of Henri II (and modified under Henri III) on the first floor of the south wing along the Seine. Its most remarkable room was the “Chambre de Parade,” where the ceremonies of the King’s levée and couchée took place, as well as receptions and public meetings. Henri Sauval (1623-76), an invaluable historiographer of Paris, describes at length the beauty of the paneling, ceilings, and decorations, while also providing rare information on the acoustic qualities of the room: The Chambre de Parade is a truly royal room. Connoisseurs and musicians find it so ideal that they not only call it the finest chamber in the world, but also assert that, of its type, it is the height of all the perfections of which the imagination can form an idea… Musicians also make observations about it that neither painters nor sculptors make… They declare that in all Paris there is no place more suitable for soft music and attribute the reason for this to the wood of its ceilings, its paneling, and the embrasures of each casement. For they are convinced that stone vaults are less flattering to concerts than those made of wood; experience having taught them that stone treats the

voice with a much greater degree of reflection and echo than wood; that it is too dry, has too much brilliance and creates excessively harsh echoes; and that, on the contrary, wood has all the softness that music can desire… (Sauval, Histoire et recherches des antiquités de la ville de Paris; Paris: Charles Moette, Jacques Chardon, 1724, vol. II, pp. 35-36). Sauval probably obtained these observations from musicians of the Musique de la Chambre du Roi, who could enjoy these ideal conditions at their leisure; and Louis XIII himself, an artistking who composed from time to time, writing several airs de cour and the Ballet de la Merlaison (Ballet of the Blackbird Hunt, 1635), from which an entrée (Les Gascons) is heard here, could not but appreciate them. It was mainly there that the sovereign heard the “concert” of his musicians, especially at his petit coucher, a custom recalled at the end of the 17th century in L’État de la France: “In the past, in Paris, there was the Musique du Petit Coucher on certain days of the week. This ensemble comprised a few voices and sometimes also a few instruments.” The antechamber was the venue for the King’s midday and evening meals (dîner and souper), which, when they were held in public, were also accompanied by music. The Cabinet du Roi, the study reserved for the monarch’s private conversations and his repose, might also echo with music on occasion. Another key center of sociability was the Queen’s apartment, located on the ground floor beneath the King’s apartment. This had been laid out by Pierre Lescot for Catherine de Medici, and was scarcely smaller than the King’s, consisting of a reception hall, an antechamber, a bedroom and wardrobe, a large study and two small ones, and an oratory. The Queen Mother Marie de Medici occupied it until her exile in 1631, whereas on the first floor Anne of Austria confined herself to the few rooms of the apartment reserved for the reigning Queen, adjoining that of the King. It was in these different spaces that the Musique de la Reine could be heard. Since the reign of Henri III, musical entertainments had normally been held in the Queen’s apartment three evenings a week, on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays. So let us allow ourselves to be guided by the echoes of these “pleasures,” inhabited by the sometimes strange and whimsical divinities, allegorical characters or characters from the realm of galanterie, which delighted Louis XIII, Marie de Medici, Anne of Austria, and their court, in what was, before Versailles, the emblematic residence of the Kings of France. —Ensemble Correspondances

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ABOUT THE ARTISTS ENSEMBLE CORRESPONDANCES Founded in Lyon in 2009, Ensemble Correspondances brings together a group of singers and instrumentalists under the direction of the harpsichordist and organist Sébastien Daucé, all of whom are specialists in the music of the Grand Siècle. In a few short years of existence, Correspondances has become a benchmark ensemble in the 17th-century French repertory. Placing itself under the auspices of Baudelaire’s notion of correspondences between the arts, it performs music whose sonorities can still directly touch today’s listeners while presenting staged productions of rarer and more original forms such as the oratorio and the ballet de cour. The ensemble’s twin commitments to breathing new life into already well-known composers and restoring the image of figures less familiar today but celebrated and frequently performed in their own time has already yielded 16 critically acclaimed recordings, which have earned such distinctions as the Choc Classica of the year, ffff de Télérama, Diapason d’Or of the year, ECHO Preis for the World Premiere Recording of the Year 2016, Editor’s Choice in Gramophone, German Record Critics’ Award, Operatic Recording of the Year 2016 in Limelight Magazine, and the Prix de l’Académie Charles Cros. All these recordings bear witness to the ensemble’s fundamental values and its exploratory spirit, whether with Marc-Antoine Charpentier in O Maria ! (2010), the Litanies de la Vierge (2013), the Pastorale de Noël et O de l’Avent (2016), La Descente d’Orphée aux Enfers (2017), or his “Histoires Sacrées” (2019), Antoine Boësset with “L’Archange et le Lys” (2011), Étienne Moulinié and his “Meslanges pour la Chapelle d’un Prince” (2015), Henry du Mont in “O Mysterium” (2016) and Michel- Richard de Lalande in his “Leçons de Ténèbres” with Sophie Karthäuser (2015); or even “Perpetual Night”, Lucile Richardot’s first solo recording (2018), acclaimed by the national and international press (German Record Critics’ Award, Choc de l’année Classica, ffff de Télérama, Diapason d’Or de l’année, Diamant d’Opéra Magazine...). The exceptional reconstruction of the score of Le Ballet Royal de la Nuit, the result of three years of research, allowed modern audiences to discover a major musical event of the 17th century, the unprecedented moment that inaugurated the reign of the Sun King. After the public and critical success of the Le Concert Royal de la Nuit, (harmonia mundi, 2015), the ensemble returned to this extraordinary spectacle in 2017 and 2020 with the théâtre de Caen in a contemporary production by Francesca Lattuada. This staged version has been published recently in a box set gathering the full music and the recording of the show.

Caroline Weynants soprano Perrine Devillers soprano Maire-Lou Jacquard mezzo soprano Paul Figuier countertenor Antonin Rondepierre tenor Étienne Bazola bass baritone Renaud Bres bass Josephe Cottet violin Simon Pierre violin Lucile Perret flutes Louise Bouedo viola de gamba Étienne Floutier viola de gamba Mathilde Vialle viola de gamba Thibaut Roussel theorbo Sébastien Daucé organ, harsichord, direction Correspondances is in residence at the théâtre de Caen. It is associate ensemble at the Opéra and Chapelle of the Château de Versailles, at the Louvre Museum, and at the Théâtre de l’Aquarium at the Cartoucherie de Vincennes. Correspondances is supported by the Ministère de la Culture - DRAC Normandie, the Région Normandie, the Ville and the théâtre de Caen. Fondation Société Générale C’est vous l’avenir is a major patron of Correspondances. The ensemble receives assistance from the Fondation Correspondances, under the aegis of the Fondation Bullukian, a group of music lovers who give active support to research into and publication and performance of the music of the 17th century. It also receives regular support from the Institut Français, the Odia Normandie, and the Centre National de la Musique for its concerts and recordings. The ensemble Correspondances is member of Arviva – Arts vivants, Arts durables, and gets involved in the environmental shift for performing arts. The ensemble is member of the FEVIS, the Profedim, and the European Early Music Network.

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SÉBASTIEN DAUCÉ Organist and harpsichordist Sébastien Daucé aims to promote the little known, yet abundant 17th-century repertoire. At the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et Danse in Lyon he studied harpsichord and bass continuo with Françoise Lengellé and Yves Rechsteiner. The exploration of a little-performed and often unpublished repertory by Ensemble Correspondances has led, with the support of the harmonia mundi label, to a discography of 13 recordings that have attracted considerable press attention and have received such distinctions as the Diapason d’Or of the Year, ffff de Télérama, Editor’s Choice in Gramophone, Choc of the Year in Classica, German Record Critics Award, and IRR Outstanding. Alongside his activities as a performing musician, Sébastien Daucé edits the music that makes up the Ensemble’s repertory, going so far as to recompose complete pieces when necessary, as in Le Ballet Royal de la Nuit. He has taught at the Pôle Supérieur de Paris since 2012. In 2018 he was Guest Artistic Director of the London Festival of Baroque Music.

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TEXTS AND TRANSLATIONS ANTOINE BOËSSET (1587-1643) Ballet des nymphes bocagères de la forêt sacrée, 1627

Ballet of the woodland nymphs of the sacred forest, 1627

“Reine que je sers et que je connais” (Concert de Diane et de ses nymphes)

“Queen that I serve and that I know” (Concert of Diane and her nymphs)

Reyne que je sers et que je cognoy Bien plus belle, et plus chaste que moy: Astre divin, flambeau nompareil, Pardonnez-moy si je vous prens pour mon Soleil.

The queen that I serve and that I know Much more beautiful, and more chaste than me: Divine star, unique beacon, Forgive me if I consider you my Sun.

Ce feu qui faisoit toute ma splendeur Ne luit plus que pour vostre grandeur, De vos Enfants il est amoureux, Et ne fait plus le tour du monde que pour eux.

This fire that made all my splendor Is now burning only for your greatness, It is in love with your Children, And it goes around the world only for them.

L’encens et les voeux que tant de mortels M’ont donnez, sont deus à vos Autels, Astre divin, flambeau nompareil, Je luis pas vous, et vous cognoy pour mon Soleil.

The incense and the wishes that so many mortals Have given me, are gifts to your Altars, Divine star, unique beacon, I glow not on you, I know you as my Sun.

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Dialogue de la troupe d’Orphée et des Hamadriades

Dialogue of the troupe of Orpheus and the Hamadriades

ORPHÉE & SA TROUPE Suivez nous belles Nymphes des bois, Qui vous cachez sous cette escorse?

ORPHEUS & HIS TROUPE Follow us beautiful Nymphs of the forest, Who are you hiding under this tree bark?

LES HAMADRIADES Qui nous attire avecques tant de force?

HAMADRIADES What attracts us with so much strength?

ORPHÉE Ce sont les accords charmants de nos douces voix.

ORPHEUS This is the charming harmony of our sweet voices.

LES HAMADRIADES Où nous conduisez-vous?

HAMADRIADES Where are you leading us?

ORPHÉE Vers le plus grand des Roys.

ORPHEUS To the greatest of all Kings.

ORPHÉE & LES HAMADRIADES Allons donc tous ensemble, accordons nos voix En l’honneur du miracle des Roys.

ORPHEUS & THE HAMADRIADES Let’s go together, let’s grant our voices In honor of the miracle of the Kings.

ORPHÉE Quittez-vous à regret les beaux lieux Où vous retenoyent vos racines?

ORPHEUS Do you leave with regret the beautiful places Where your roots hold you back?

LES HAMADRIADES Ô que d’attraits! que de beautez divines!

HAMADRIADES Oh, only attractions! Only divine beauty!

ORPHÉE Un bien plus charmant objet va ravir vos yeux;

ORPHEUS Something much more charming will be a delight to your eyes;

LES HAMADRIADES Et que verrons-nous plus?

HAMADRIADES And what more will we see?

ORPHÉE Un Roy chery des Cieux.

ORPHEUS A King beloved in Heaven.

ORPHÉE & LES HAMADRIADES Allons donc tous ensemble, accordons nos voix En l’honneur du miracle des Roys.

ORPHEUS & THE HAMADRIADES Let’s go together, let’s grant our voices In honor of the miracle of all Kings.

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PIERRE GUÉDRON (ca. 1565-1620) Cesse mortel d’importuner (Juste mespris de saincte Agnez)

Cease, mortal, to importune (Just contempt of Saint Agnes)

Cesse Mortel d’importuner Mon chaste cœur de tes complaintes, Je ne le peux abandonner À l’artifice de tes plaintes; Un Dieu tant seulement, Doit estre aimé parfaictement.

Cease, mortal, from importuning My chaste heart with your laments; I cannot abandon it To the stratagem of your complaints; One God alone Must be loved perfectly.

Fuis promptement loing de mes yeux Gibier de la mort éternelle, Je voy dans la flamme des Cieux Que la tienne est trop criminelle. Un Dieu tant seulement, Doit estre aimé parfaictement

Flee from my eyes at once, Prey of eternal death; I see by the flame of Heaven That your flame is all too wicked. One God alone Must be loved perfectly.

Voudrais-tu bien te comparer Au doux amant qui m’a choisie? Luy penses-tu faire endurer Les tourments de la jalousie? Un Dieu tant seulement, Doit estre aimé parfaictement

Would you compare yourself To the sweet Lover who has chosen me? Do you think you can make Him endure The torments of jealousy? One God alone Must be loved perfectly.

Son père est plus beau qu’un Soleil, Sa mère enchérit sur la Lune, Et le fils n’a point de pareil Dans le bonheur de sa fortune. Un Dieu tant seulement, Doit estre aimé parfaictement.

His Father is more beautiful than a sun, His Mother is fairer than the moon, And the Son has no peer In the happiness His fortune brings. One God alone Must be loved perfectly.

“Quels tourments rigoroux” (Le Purgatoire)

“What rigorous torments” (Purgatory)

Quels tourments rigoureux Souffrons-nous dans ces feux Pour un plaisir volage? Nos maux sont douloureux: Mais, l’espoir nous soulage.

What rigorous torments We are suffering from in these fires For a fickle pleasure? Our ills are painful: But hope gives us relief.

Dans les lieux obscurcis Nos esprits sont transis Pensant à leur dommage, Nous plaignons nos soucis : Mais l’espoir nous soulage.

In dark places Our spirits are cold Thinking of the damage done to them, We complain about our worries: But hope gives us relief.

Ce qui fait au milieu Des ombres de ce lieu Nostre esprit tout sauvage, C’est de ne voir point Dieu: Mais l’espoir nous soulage.

What is our wild spirit doing Among The shadows of this place Where God cannot be seen? But hope gives us relief.

Le plus grand des malheurs Qui nous résout en pleurs, C’est que son beau visage Se cache à nos douleurs: Mais l’espoir nous soulage.

The greatest of misfortunes Which bring us tears, Is that his beautiful face Hides in our pains: But hope gives us relief.

Thompson Arts Center at Park Avenue Armory | 643 Park Avenue at 67th Street

ÉTIENNE MOULINIÉ (1599-1676) “Il sort de nos corps emplumés” (Concert de différents oyseaux) du Ballet du monde renversé (1625)

“He comes out of our feathered bodies” (Concert of various birds) from Ballet of the Reversed World (1625)

Il sort de nos corps emplumés Des voix plus divines qu’humaines, Qui tiennent les soucis charmés, Et font dormir les peines.

He comes out of our feathered bodies Voices more divine than those of a human, Voices that charm all the worries, And put to sleep all the pain.

Nous vous appellons à tesmoins, Que si nos voix font des merveilles, Nos Luths ne penetrent pas moins Les coeurs, que les oreilles.

We call you to witness, That if our voices do wonders, Our lutes penetrate The hearts, just as much as the ears.

Gardez de vous abuser tous, Ce seroyent choses estranges, Si les Corbeaux et les Hibous Chantoyent comme des Anges.

You all, do not be deceived, It would be strange, If Ravens and Owls Sang like angels.

Nous sommes des Dieux deguisez Qu’en ce lieu ces beautez attirent, Et c’est pour nos coeurs embrasez Que nos bouches soupirent.

We are Gods in disguise Attracted by the beauty of this place, And it’s for our burning hearts That our mouths sigh.

ANTOINE BOËSSET (1587-1643) “Ne vante point flambeau des Cieux”

“Do not vaunt, you, Heaven’s torch”