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CD18

Released August 25th 2007

Louis-François Dauprat's

Duos for natural horns, opus 13

volume 2

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Mr. Burdick’s Dauprat recordings are as follows:

CD9: Duets, Op. 13 volume 1 (currently not available, and will redo in 2023.)
CD14: Quartets, Op. 8
CD16: Duets Op. 14
CD18: Duets, Op. 13 volume 2
CD19: Grand Trios Op. 4 & Grand Sextet Op. 10
CD19a: Grand Trios Op. 26

These five CD’s make a complete set of Duaprat’s published music for horn ensemble.

Louis-François Dauprat was the horn professor at the Paris conservatory in Beethoven's time. He was singly responsible for stalling the development of the Valve horn in France, by as much as 40 years! His compositions are fine early romantic works highly influenced by his teacher Anton Reicha. His writing for natural horn is unbelievably chromatic with keys remote from what would be expected in what normally would be a very limited instrument. His works are outstanding! Performance of his works could only be done by a virtuoso! Great mastery of the natural horn is required to play these works; hear one of today’s few natural horn artist. in this amazing recording.

	Duo #3
1	Allegro Moderato		4:12
2	Adagio		4:24
3	Minuetto		5:01
4	Finale – Allegro non troppo		3:53
	Duo #5
5	Moderato		4:39
6	Minuetto		3:23
7	Largo		4:46
8	Bolero		3:12
	Duo #6
9	Allegro maestoso e sostenuto		6:48
10	Lento non troppo		6:50
11	Minuetto		4:04
12	Rondeau – poco agitato		4:10
		Total time	55:43

Dauprat’s intimate knowledge of hand horn techniques makes this opus a compositional tour de force. Not only does he use all twelve notes of the chromatic scale in nearly every piece, he also pioneers the use of key signatures of up to four sharps and four flats for an instrument which was generally restricted to C major. His stated purpose in writing these duos was to write in all the major and minor scales practicable on a single crook. His ideas of what was practicable went far beyond the usual practice of his time, and his goal was at least as much aesthetic as technical. He exploited the positioning of stopped notes to produce distinct moods and tone qualities for each key, much as J.S. Bach did in the Well-Tempered Clavier. For the natural horn, C major and the sharp keys are cheerful and brilliant because they contain many open notes. The sharp notes are often leading tones, so the hand position is more open than would otherwise be the case.

Dauprat pushes the natural horn to its limits in remote keys. Volume 2 of these opus 13 duets written for Eb horns are in three primary keys: #3 is in Bb Major, #5 in Ab Major and #6 is in G Major. Bb major puts the fundamental on
the 3rd, 6th or 12th harmonic of the horn, which is not too unusual, but Ab Major puts the fundamental either on a 3rd or 6th harmonic lowered a whole step by the hand and mouth use, or the 11th harmonic dropped down 3/4 of a
step - difficult tone control is need for this key. And the 6th duet is in G Major with departures to C minor, B Major, Ab Major, and more. Fundamentals on the 5th or 10th harmonic aren’t too bad, but Ab Major is done almost entirely with the bell covered! Unheard of by any other composer! The stopped notes sound veiled and mysterious, rather than deficient. This sound was so highly regarded that the Conservatoire National did not discontinue its natural horn curriculum until 1903!

Richard plays a horn made by Marcel-Auguste Raoux in the 1840s, modified by Lowell Greer.

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