Antoine Boësset, Antoine Boesset or Anthoine de Boesset (1586 – 8 December 1643), Sieur de Villedieu, was the superintendent of music at the

Ancien Régime ''Ancien'' may refer to * the French word for " ancient, old" ** Société des anciens textes français * the French for "former, senior" ** Virelai ancien ** Ancien Régime ** Ancien Régime in France {{disambig ...

French court and a composer of secular music, particularly

airs de cour The ''air de cour'' was a popular type of secular vocal music in France in the late Renaissance and early Baroque period, from about 1570 until around 1650. From approximately 1610 to 1635, during the reign of Louis XIII, this was the predominant ...

. He and his father-in-law Pierre Guédron dominated the court's musical life for the first half of the 17th century under

Louis XIII Louis XIII (; sometimes called the Just; 27 September 1601 – 14 May 1643) was King of France from 1610 until his death in 1643 and King of Navarre (as Louis II) from 1610 to 1620, when the crown of Navarre was merged with the French crown. ...

. His son Jean-Baptiste eBoesset, Sieur de Dehault, composed church music.

Life

Born at

Blois Blois ( ; ) is a commune and the capital city of Loir-et-Cher Departments of France, department, in Centre-Val de Loire, France, on the banks of the lower Loire river between Orléans and Tours. With 45,898 inhabitants by 2019, Blois is the mos ...

and baptised there on 24 February 1587, he was made master of the children within the musical household of the ''Chambre du roi'' in 1613. He rose to be the queen's music master in 1617 and secretary to the ''Chambre du roi'' in 1620, and finally ''surintendant'' of the musical household of the ''Chambre du roi'' in 1623 – in the last of these roles he succeeded Guédron (''surintendant'' under Henry IV and Louis XIII), whose daughter he married in 1613. In 1632 he was ''conseiller'' and ''

maître d'hôtel The ; ), head waiter, host, waiter captain, or ''maître d'' ( , ) manages the public part, or "front of the house", of a formal restaurant. The responsibilities of a ''maître d'hôtel'' generally include supervising the waiting staff, welcom ...

'' ''ordinaire du roi.'' He then held all these posts simultaneously until his death. At the court he got to know Descartes, Mersenne and Huygens. Around 1640 Mersenne arranged a contest between Boësset and the Dutch Catholic priest Joan Albert Ban to set Germain Habert's poem "Me veux-tu voir mourir", but altered the poem's first line and thus its sense in the copy sent to Boësset – this influenced the setting and allowed Boësset to easily win the competition (Mersenne had already criticised Ban's work as boring and trivial). Boësset was also one of the forerunners of the ''

basso continuo Basso continuo parts, almost universal in the Baroque era (1600–1750), provided the harmonic structure of the music by supplying a bassline and a chord progression. The phrase is often shortened to continuo, and the instrumentalists playing th ...

'' in France. He died in Paris in 1643.

Works

*9 ''Livres d'airs de cour'' (''Books of airs de cour'') for 4 and 5 voices (1617–1642 ; republished 1689) *Dozens of ''airs de cour'' for voice and lute (in anthologies published by Ballard) *Many

ballet Ballet () is a type of performance dance that originated during the Italian Renaissance in the fifteenth century and later developed into a concert dance form in France and Russia. It has since become a widespread and highly technical form of ...

s (1614-1639) *3

mass Mass is an Intrinsic and extrinsic properties, intrinsic property of a physical body, body. It was traditionally believed to be related to the physical quantity, quantity of matter in a body, until the discovery of the atom and particle physi ...

es, 5

motet In Western classical music, a motet is mainly a vocal musical composition, of highly diverse form and style, from high medieval music to the present. The motet was one of the preeminent polyphonic forms of Renaissance music. According to the Eng ...

s and a ''

Magnificat The Magnificat (Latin for "y soulmagnifies he Lord) is a canticle, also known as the Song of Mary or Canticle of Mary, and in the Byzantine Rite as the Ode of the Theotokos (). Its Western name derives from the incipit of its Latin text. This ...

'' A critical edition of the ''airs de cour'' is being prepared by the Centre de Musique Baroque de Versailles (http://www.cmbv.com).

Bibliography

*Julie Anne Sadie, Christopher Hogwood
''Companion to Baroque Music''
*Caswell A. B., The Development of Seventeenth-Century French Vocal Ornamentation and its Influence upon Late Baroque Ornamentation Practice (thèse). University of Minnesota 1964 * Cauchie M., La dynastie des Boesset. In "Bulletin de la Société française de musicologie" (4, 6) 1920, p. 13-26 *Cohen A., A Study of Notational and Performance Problems of an Early Air de cour : Je voudrois bien, ô Cloris (1629) by Antoine Boësset (c 1586–1643). In E. Borroff (éd.), «Notations and Editions : a Book in Honor of Louise Cuyler», Dubuque (Ia.) 1974, p. 55-68 * Durosoir G., L'Air de cour en France: 1571–1655. Liège 1991 * Prunières Henri, Le ballet de cour en France avant Benserade et Lully. Paris 1914 * Verchaly A. (ed), Airs de cour pour voix et luth. Paris 1961 * —, La poésie française baroque et sa musique (1580–1645). Actes des journées internationales d'étude du Baroque III : Montauban 1968, p. 127-136 * —, A propos du récit français au début du XVIIe siècle. In "Recherches sur la musique française classique" (15) 1975, p. 39-46

References

External links

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Listings
at Gallica {{DEFAULTSORT:Boesset, Antoine French male classical composers French Baroque composers French ballet composers French musicians 17th-century French composers People from Blois 1586 births 1643 deaths 17th-century classical composers 17th-century male musicians