Description
The composer and harpsichordist Anne-Louise Brillon de Jouy was born in Paris in 1744, and died in 1824 in Villers-sur-Mer in Normandie. She married Jacques Brillon de Jouy 22 years her senior,and had two daughters, Cunégonde and Aldegonde, Anne-Louise Brillon de Jouy had a salon in Passy whose guests included the violinist Jean-Pierre Pagin and cellist and composer Luigi Boccherini. Benjamin Franklin was also a frequent vistor and Madame Brillon has an extensive correspondence with him, including the period after his stay in Paris during the American Revolution .Many of her compositions were purchased in 1957 by the American Philosophical Society of Philadelphia, in honor of this friendship.
In 2021, French Pianist Nicolas Horvath recorded a landmark CD for Grand Piano (GP872-73) of Brillon’s keyboard noatas with extensive notes by Aliette de Laleu, Deborah Hayes and Nicolas Horvath and Christine de Pas The keyboard sonatas published here are intended to document this reocrding.
The manuscript of the Sonata in A minor, Madame Brillon’s only solo keyboard work, s in her hand. Crossed-out measures and partially abbreviated notation indicate that t was for her own use in salon performances. This is probably an early work, given the classical haronic vocabulary and typical classical balance of the forms. The second movement is more virtuosic, with an initial theme in four octaves, scales in doubled thirds and figures which are in alternate hands.