At the end of the 17th century, under the impetus of Louis XIV, women began to take an increasingly prominent place in sacred music. Until then, the upper vocal parts had been entrusted to choirboys and castrati. Lalande’s daughters, as well as Marguerite Louise Couperin, were among the very first women allowed to sing from the gallery of the Royal Chapel of Versailles.

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Vocal parts became more and more virtuosic; crowds gathered to hear the great sopranos of the Opera perform during Tenebrae services, and convents and religious institutions such as the Demoiselles of Saint-Cyr shone through their musical excellence.

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In this program of motets by François Couperin, we have chosen to use a small women’s choir instead of the two solo voices usually assigned to the polyphonic passages. This configuration offers a new perspective of remarkable depth on this wonderful music, recreating the distinctive atmosphere of the female ensembles found in religious institutions at the dawn of the Age of Enlightenment.

Thus the famous Third Lesson of Tenebrae, composed for the Abbey of Longchamp, reveals itself as a remarkable dialogue between the solo verses and the duets entrusted to the women’s choir, which here resembles a true schola.