Daniel-Ben Pienaar - Gaspard Le Roux: Complete Suites

AVIE Records, 2025

More information is available about the life and music of the “American Phantom,” Robert Johnson (1911-1938), than about Baroque French harpsichordist and composer Gaspard Le Roux (c. 1670–c.1706). Johnson left twelve 78-rpm shellac recordings that gave rise to 60 years of impressive scholarship and an elusive biography. We know Le Roux only from some spurious mentions in the period art press, a few tax and banking records, and the 1705 publication of Pieces de Clavessin, keyboard compositions that are arranged into seven ‘suites’ (though the composer did not use that term).

For all his anonymity, Le Roux’s suites garnered much modern interest as evidenced by recordings made by Christophe Rousset, Lisa Goode Crawford and Mitzi Meyerson, Bibiane Lapointe and Thierry Maeder, and Pieter-Jan Belder and Siebe Henstra. Daniel-Ben Pienaar’s set distinguishes itself as the first recording of these pieces made on a modern piano. Stylistically, Pienaar places these pieces between the older French keyboard masters represented by Louis Couperin and Jean-Henri D’Anglebert and the more progressive keyboardists of the 18th century: Jean-Philippe Rameau and François Couperin. Mixed in genre chronology is Élisabeth Jacquet de La Guerre, whose impact was like that of Le Roux, though their styles differed.

What this adds up to is music that transitioned from the harpsichord to the modern piano with a punctilious grace as directed by Pienaar’s informed and sensitive performance. These pieces lack the ornateness of François Couperin or Rameau, but keep a stumbling elegance to their transitional nature. This recording will appeal to all listeners who appreciate harpsichord music performed on piano and those who are looking for music off the beaten path.