Charpentier: Nine Settings of the Litanies de la Vierge

Although Charpentier is regarded as one of the foremost composers of late seventeenth-century France, little of his enormously varied output of liturgical music is known. This volume contains his nine settings of the Litanies de la Vierge, also known as the Litany of Loreto, which are scored for a variety of vocal and instrumental forces ranging from two settings for three voices and continuo to a large-scale, multipartite setting for soloists, chorus, recorders, violins, and continuo. The edition is based on the autograph scores of these works, scattered throughout the twenty-six volumes of the Mélanges autographes, held by the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris (Rès. Vm1 159).

Litanies de la Vierge à 3 voix pareilles (H. 82)

Litanies de la Vierge à 6 voix et deux dessus de violles (H. 83)

Litanies de la Vierge à 3 voix pareilles avec instruments (H. 84)

Litanies de la Vierge (H. 85)

Litanies de la Vierge à 2 dessus et une basse chantante (H. 86)

Litanies de la Vierge à 4 voix (H. 87)

Litanies de la Vierge à 4 voix (H. 88)

Litanies de la Vierge (H. 89)

Courtes Litanies de la Vierge à 4 voix (H. 90)

Jean-Paul Montagnier, Revue de Musicologie, 1998; Fred Hauptman, Notes, December 1995; C Jane Gosine, Early Music, August 1997, Early Music Review, October 1994