Like Chevalier de Saint-Georges, François-André Danican Philidor gained fame both as a composer and a sportsman. In addition to his facility as a composer of opera and as a pioneer in the field of opéra-comique, Philidor was the most famous chess master of his era, celebrated for his ability to win games while blindfolded. While this has kept Philidor's great chess playing manual Analyse du jeu des échecs in print for more than two and a half centuries, very little of his music has been recorded. This is due to the fact ...
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Like Chevalier de Saint-Georges, François-André Danican Philidor gained fame both as a composer and a sportsman. In addition to his facility as a composer of opera and as a pioneer in the field of opéra-comique, Philidor was the most famous chess master of his era, celebrated for his ability to win games while blindfolded. While this has kept Philidor's great chess playing manual Analyse du jeu des échecs in print for more than two and a half centuries, very little of his music has been recorded. This is due to the fact that, outside of his operas, not much of it survives -- not a single one of his sacred compositions has come down to us, and his set of six quartets, L'art de la modulation (1755), appears to be Philidor's only contribution to instrumental music. Nevertheless, this Naxos issue of Philidor's big secular oratorio Carmen Saeculare is the second recording made of this work, and it is interesting to note that the same conductor, noted early music specialist Jean-Claude Malgoire, leads...
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