Jean-François Dandrieu

His date of birth is not established: 1682 for the French Wikipedia article, between 11 September 1681 and 17 January 1682 according to Grove as cited by the BnF, 11 September 1681 according to Musicologie.org. He was the son of Jean d’Andrieu, a prosperous maker of cases and leather goods, and Françoise Rondeau. The family, which came from Angers, lived with the uncle Pierre, priest and organist of Saint-Barthélemy, in a large house in the rue Sainte-Anne, near the Palais. He had a brother, Nicolas, and two sisters, one of whom, Jeanne-Françoise, became like him a harpsichordist and organist. He never married.

His first lessons may have come from his uncle. Titon du Tillet lists him among the pupils of Jean-Baptiste Moreau, an Angevin like his father, alongside Clérambault: “two of our most famous organists”. A child prodigy, he played the harpsichord at the age of five before the Princess Palatine, Louis XIV’s sister-in-law, to whom he would dedicate his book of trio sonatas in 1705; the English article speaks of a performance before the king and his court.

At Saint-Merry he followed Nicolas Lebègue, who had died in 1702, but the sources disagree on the dates. The English article has him playing in the church from 1700, at eighteen, and appointed titular organist in 1705; the French article makes him titular organist in 1704, succeeding Henry Mayhieux; the German article has him in post from 1704 but officially appointed on 20 July 1705. He kept this post until his death. In 1706 he sat on the jury of the competition at Sainte-Marie-Madeleine-en-la-Cité, which chose Rameau; when Rameau refused the terms of the post, the organ went to Louis-Antoine Dornel.

In 1721 he became one of the four organists of the Chapelle royale, serving by quarter; the German article specifies that he was appointed on 17 December, in place of Jean-Baptiste Buterne, while Musicologie.org has him organist of the chapel as early as 1717. Louis-Claude Daquin was to succeed him. In 1733, on his uncle’s death, he took over the organ of Saint-Barthélemy, which he held together with Saint-Merry. Musicologie.org notes a contradiction: as early as 1710 his second book of sonatas already described him as organist of that church.

He died in Paris on 17 January 1738 and was buried at Saint-Barthélemy; his grave disappeared with the church. His sister Jeanne-Françoise succeeded him at the organ, where, according to Titon du Tillet, she drew lovers of the instrument on high feast days; the Elector of Bavaria had retained her as his harpsichordist during his stay in France.

Dandrieu first published three “youthful” harpsichord books, from about 1704 to 1720; between 1724 and 1734 came three more which he called the First, Second and Third, as though the earlier ones had never existed. He also wrote trio sonatas (1705), violin sonatas, a suite of symphonies, Les Caractères de la guerre (1718), and Principes de l’accompagnement du clavecin (1718, c. 1719 according to Musicologie.org), a valuable source on the practice of his time.

Titon du Tillet found his music “harmonious and singing”, rather in the character of François Couperin’s, “clean, beautiful, flowing” and free of those “hazardous passages” which “surprise the mind more than they touch it”. Modern accounts also recognise the kinship with Couperin, but point to a firmer counterpoint, which has been likened to that of the Germans. In number of pieces, his harpsichord output is the largest in France after those of Couperin and Jean-Nicolas Geoffroy.

The Premier livre de pièces d’orgue, prepared shortly before his death, appeared early in 1739. The preface describes it as “made up of six suites in different keys, half of them minor and half major”; each suite opens with an offertory, continues with separate pieces and ends with a Magnificat in the same key, intended to alternate with the choir. Plainchant hardly appears any more, except in two fugues, and several offertories are transcriptions of his trio sonatas: Dandrieu thus moves away, the French article notes, from the great tradition of liturgical organ music. Yet the preface speaks of his scruples: the difficulty of writing pieces “worthy of the majesty of the place” had “long made him hesitate”, and only the needs of those “consecrated to the service of the altar” persuaded him. Titon du Tillet noted that most of his organ pieces could also be played on the harpsichord.

The collection of Noëls, O filii, chansons de Saint-Jacques, Stabat Mater et carillons that appeared under his name in 1759, probably through his sister’s efforts, takes up his uncle Pierre’s book, which the nephew had pruned, rewritten and completed. The 1739 book was republished by Guilmant in the seventh volume of the Archives des maîtres de l’orgue. Michel Rusquet singles out some of the offertories and a récit de trompette séparée ou de cromorne in A minor. The site offers several pieces from it, including the first suite in D, the Magnificat in the first tone and the Easter offertory on O filii, as well as noëls.