Peter Bressan
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Peter Bressan (1663 - 1731) was a noted woodwind instrument maker of whose work several examples exist in museums and private collections.


Life

Peter Bressan was born as Pierre Jaillard in
Bourg-en-Bresse Bourg-en-Bresse (; frp, Bôrg) is the Prefectures in France, prefecture of the Ain Departments of France, department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes Regions of France, region in Eastern France. Located northeast of Lyon, it is the capital of the ...
, France, May 27, 1663 and died April 21,1732 in
Tournai Tournai or Tournay ( ; ; nl, Doornik ; pcd, Tornai; wa, Tornè ; la, Tornacum) is a city and municipality of Wallonia located in the province of Hainaut, Belgium. It lies southwest of Brussels on the river Scheldt. Tournai is part of Euromet ...
, Belgium. Pierre was probably educated at the College in Bourg until he was apprenticed for two years to Jean Boysser a master turner at the age of fifteen. It is not known where he learned his instrument making skills but it is surmised that he may have studied under the Hotteterres in Paris. In 1691 Pierre was recorded as having played the hautboy (oboe) for William III of England. Subsequently, there are a number of references to him by authors of the time and later as a maker and seller of musical instruments including recorders, voice flutes, flutes, oboes and bassoons. At some point he changed his surname to Bressan; possibly because 'Jaillard' proved hard for the English to pronounce. His workshop and home was located in Dutchy House, in part of the old
Savoy Palace The Savoy Palace, considered the grandest nobleman's townhouse of medieval London, was the residence of prince John of Gaunt until it was destroyed during rioting in the Peasants' Revolt of 1381. The palace was on the site of an estate given to ...
in London. This part of London had a rich history and for many years had sheltered foreigners and especially French nationals. Bressan arrived in England in 1688, had made a fortune by the time of his marriage in 1703. He and his wife Mary Margaret had ten children but only four survived to adulthood. His trade had fallen off by 1713 perhaps due to the decline in popularity of the recorder. His substantial fortune was diminished by litigation, by the extravagance of his wife, and especially by their involvement in the financial crash of the
South Sea Bubble South is one of the cardinal directions or compass points. The direction is the opposite of north and is perpendicular to both east and west. Etymology The word ''south'' comes from Old English ''sūþ'', from earlier Proto-Germanic ''*sunþaz ...
in 1720. He became naturalised in 1723. Bressan died in 1731 while living alone in
Tournai Tournai or Tournay ( ; ; nl, Doornik ; pcd, Tornai; wa, Tornè ; la, Tornacum) is a city and municipality of Wallonia located in the province of Hainaut, Belgium. It lies southwest of Brussels on the river Scheldt. Tournai is part of Euromet ...
, Belgium. His will shows him to have been relatively well off, as it includes paintings, busts and many musical instruments.


Work

Surviving instruments by Bressan include 51 recorders and 3 transverse flutes. The recorders comprise one descant, 27 trebles, 13 voice flutes, 12 tenors and six bassets, or bass recorders. Except for the bassets, most are scaled in total external length in an exact ratio to the treble: 4th flute 3/4, voice flute 6/5, and tenor flute 4/3. Two of his transverse flutes have an earlier style single centre joint and one with four joints is unusually decorated with silver piqué (possibly the work of Peter Simon, Bressan's brother-in-law, a silversmith). No examples of his oboes or bassoons are known to exist. The
Grosvenor Museum Grosvenor Museum is a museum in Chester, Cheshire, in the United Kingdom. It is recorded in the National Heritage List for England as a designated Grade II listed building. Its full title is The Grosvenor Museum of Natural History and Archa ...
in
Chester Chester is a cathedral city and the county town of Cheshire, England. It is located on the River Dee, close to the English–Welsh border. With a population of 79,645 in 2011,"2011 Census results: People and Population Profile: Chester Loca ...
has six of his recorders, four of which form a matched set always kept together as a recorder consort or quartet consisting of a soprano in F4 of 20 inches, an alto in D4 of 24 inches, a tenor in C4 of 26¾ inches and a bass in F3 of 42½ inches. This quartet belonged to the Cholmondeley family of
Cheshire Cheshire ( ) is a ceremonial and historic county in North West England, bordered by Wales to the west, Merseyside and Greater Manchester to the north, Derbyshire to the east, and Staffordshire and Shropshire to the south. Cheshire's county t ...
and was found in an attic around 1845. It was given to the Chester and North Wales Archaeological Society whose collections later passed into the ownership of the Grosvenor Museum. The
Dayton Miller Dayton Clarence Miller (March 13, 1866 – February 22, 1941) was an American physicist, astronomer, acoustician, and accomplished amateur flautist. An early experimenter of X-rays, Miller was an advocate of aether theory and absolute space ...
collection of flutes and other wind instruments in the
Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library is ...
,
Washington Washington commonly refers to: * Washington (state), United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A metonym for the federal government of the United States ** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered o ...
, has 5 recorders by Bressan, illustrated in high definition photographs on their website. The
Bate Collection The Bate Collection of Musical Instruments is a collection of historic musical instruments, mainly for Western classical music, from the Middle Ages onwards. It is housed in Oxford University's Faculty of Music near Christ Church on St. Ald ...
in Oxford has a well known example of an alto recorder on which a number of modern copies have been based, as well as a bass recorder which can be heard playing together on a YouTube video. The recorder player
Frans Brüggen Franciscus ("Frans") Jozef Brüggen (30 October 1934 – 13 August 2014) was a Dutch Conducting, conductor, recorder player and baroque flautist. Biography Born in Amsterdam, Brüggen was the last of the nine children of August Brüggen, a textile ...
had a collection of historical instruments amongst which are a number of original Bressans, including the voice flute. The instruments are finely made usually in boxwood or fruitwood and decorated with ivory rings. Three surviving bass recorders, found in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, the Grosvenor museum, Chester and St Peter Hungate, Norwich are described with their measurements and compared to those of lost bass recorder by Bressan described by James Talbot in a
Christ Church, Oxford Christ Church ( la, Ædes Christi, the temple or house, '' ædēs'', of Christ, and thus sometimes known as "The House") is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in England. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, the college is uniqu ...
manuscript of 1640.


Legacy

Bressan's surviving instruments are of renowned quality and have inspired a number of reproduction instruments. Comparisons of the existing recorders have been made by Bouterse,Bouterse, Jan, "Bressan alto recorders: pitch and sound; and some tips to make a copy", in: ''The Fellowship of Makers and Researchers of Historic Instruments, Communication 1910'', 2010 including notes on how to replicate them and the problems of re-scaling the copies so that they can be played at the modern
concert pitch Concert pitch is the pitch (music), pitch reference to which a group of musical instruments are musical tuning, tuned for a performance. Concert pitch may vary from musical ensemble, ensemble to ensemble, and has varied widely over music history. ...
standards of A=440 or A=415 hertz. Zen-On makes two plastic versions of an alto by Bressan, one scaled to play at A=440 hertz, and one at A=415.


References

{{Reflist French musical instrument makers