Jean-Baptiste Nôtre

He was born in the parish of Saint-Jean in Toul. His father, Jacob Notter, from Mels near Sargans in Switzerland, had served as a soldier in the Esly regiment before marrying in Toul in 1721 and settling there; he became the cathedral’s verger (suisse) under the French form of his name, Jacques Nôtre. Jean-Baptiste was first a choirboy of the cathedral and probably received his first organ lessons from the organists Noirel and Martelet.

In 1754 the canons granted him a bursary to study for six months in Paris with Guillaume-Antoine Calvière, one of the organists of the Chapelle royale and titular of Notre-Dame, who died the following year. On his return they appointed him organist of the cathedral; the authority record of the BnF calls him organist of Toul Cathedral “from 1754”. There he found a new instrument, built by Nicolas Dupont between 1751 and 1755. In 1757 he married in Nancy Françoise Mangin, an innkeeper’s daughter, with whom he had five children; their daughter Marguerite (1759–1837) became organist of the parish of Saint-Jacques in Lunéville.

His reputation spread beyond Toul. He was asked to examine the organs of the Cistercian abbey of Notre-Dame de Beaupré in 1775, the abbey church of Saint-Pierre-et-Saint-Paul at Neuwiller-lès-Saverne in 1778, the abbey of Saint-Vincent in Metz in 1779 and Nancy Cathedral in 1787 and 1789. The English article adds that in 1775 he accepted and played the Küttinger organ at Vézelise. In 1793 he was commissioned to value the organs of all the churches of Toul, which had become national property. The Revolution suspended his activities for a time, but he remained organist of the cathedral until his death in 1807.

His known work is contained in a single collection, preserved in the municipal library of Châlons-en-Champagne (manuscript 941) among the scores of the organist Jean-Baptiste Charbonnier (1764–1859), and entitled Livres de piesses d’orgue par l’organiste de Toul. It contains eight suites arranged by tone, each of nine short pieces, which may be versets for the Magnificat. Each begins with a plein jeu and a fugue grave and ends with one or two grands jeux; in between come duos, trios, récits, cornets, basses de trompette, a récit de cromorne in the second tone and pieces headed “Clairinette”. IMSLP dates the collection to around 1770.

While remaining within the French tradition of liturgical organ books, the collection reflects, according to the Wikipedia article, the changing taste of the second half of the 18th century, in particular the influence of German music for the fortepiano. The pieces are written without obligatory pedal and can be played on the piano. The book has been edited by Jean-Luc Gester, with an introduction by Jean-Luc Gester and Damien Vaisse, and recorded both at Toul Cathedral and at Vézelise.