L'Art de toucher le clavecin

Historical context

Couperin published his work, L’art de toucher le clavecin, in Paris in 1717. This publication, whose full title is ‘Me’thode, ou 1’art de toucher le clavecin, y compris huit Preludes’, is described by the book as Couperin’s excellent ‘Mdthode’ for the clavecin. In it, Couperin gives numerous examples of the employment of the thumb, though in a very unmethodical way, as the book notes. He uses the thumb on the first note of an ascending scale, for changes of fingers on a single note, and for extensions, but in passing it under the fingers, he only uses the first finger, except in two cases. One example of Couperin’s fingering shows the second finger of the left hand passed over the thumb, and another shows the thumb passed under the third finger, in a fashion illustrated in his composition ‘Le Moucheron’.

This ‘Me’thode’ had an unmistakeable influence on Sebastian Bach’s practice, as the book details, including his mode of touch, fingering, and execution of ‘les agremens’ (shakes, turns, arpeggii). Its impact also extended to the shape and contents of some of Bach’s contributions to the instrument’s literature, such as his suites and partitas.

Drawn from George Grove; J. A. Fuller-Maitland (ed.), Grove’s Dictionary of Music and Musicians (2nd ed.), Vol. 2 (1906); George Grove (ed.), A Dictionary of Music and Musicians (A.D. 1450-1880), Vol. 1 (1879) — public domain, archive.org.