Francois Couperin : Les Sylvains : Bergmann

Francois Couperin  (Arranged for guitar by Michel Cardin)

Bergmann Edition : 7 pages

Couperin of course was a Baroque composer

 Who played Harpsichord and Organ, and this piece is the fifth piece from the 1st Ordre and arranged for guitar by Michel Cardin.

As with much Baroque keyboard music there are a large number of ornamental notes in multiple patterns throughout this piece, which do of course add to the difficulty of playing this fine piece.To give you an example the first page has 15 bars of music, every bar of which has an ornament, and this does continue for much of the piece. It is now in G major, with a dropped 6^th string to D, and is largely in two voices throughout its 74 bars of music (not counting repeat sections).

The actual music itself is very effective, and, disregarding the ornaments, not too difficult, and generally staying in the lower frets of the guitar. It is the ornamental writing that takes this piece into a completely different difficulty factor, and providing you are up to the challenge, you will find this piece works really well on our guitar.

Chris Dumigan