Like the Bachs in Saxony, the Couperins were France’s leading musical dynasty during the Baroque era. Many of the Couperins taught French royalty and held organ posts for some 173 years at the Church of Saint-Gervais in Paris. The more important Couperins include Louis (1626-1661), Armand-Louis (1727-1789) and of course the most celebrated of all, François "Le Grand" (1668-1733), admired and commemorated by many later composers, including Brahms, Strauss and Ravel. Louis, the first important composer of the dynasty, was a violist, harpsichordist, and organist. He was the son of Charles Couperin (ca. 1595-1654) and thus an uncle of the only more distinguished member of the Couperin family, François "Le Grand." Louis came to Paris from Chaumes, with his two brothers, under the sponsorship of Chambonnières by the year 1651 and he spent the rest of his short life there. In 1653 Louis became the organist at St. Gervais. He played treble viol and, according to one 18thcentury scholar, organ in the French royal chapel, played in the productions of several ballets, and was in contact with many notable composers of his time, including Froberger. His known works number slightly over 200. All instrumental, they include about 130 for harpsichord, about 75 for organ, and fewer than ten for small ensembles.
But it is his nephew, Francois, regarded as the most important French composer between Lully and Rameau, whose harpsichord music epitomizes French Baroque style and technique. It was he who insisted upon using the thumb at the keyboard, a quickly adopted practice replacing an earlier eight- finger technique. Before Francois, music for clavecin was modeled on lute music, predominantly dance movements organized into suites. In his four published books of "Pièces de clavecin" (1713, 1717, 1722 and 1730), Francois Couperin grouped his over 200 pieces by key (major/minor relationships) called ordres, of which there are 27. Many are fancifully titled and contain puns, anagrams and topical moments. Many are portraits or descriptive miniatures, and many are in dance form.
-- Kendall Briggs