Don, it was good to see this.

I played harpsichord for 12 years, and concentrated on Froberger and
Frescobaldi, with some Louis Couperin.  Brought the first Frescobaldi
Toccata, Book 1, to Bob van Asperen for a private lesson during a time I
was in an 'advanced' workshop in Vancouver but playing Italian violin trio
sonatas on my recorders and unable to take the harpsichord classes so he
was gracious enough to give me a private lesson (for free!)

I'm an earnest amateur keyboard who loves 17th century music.  It occurred
to me you and maybe a few others might be interested in seeing the score or
sheet music to Louis Couperin's Unmeasured Prelude #9 and maybe not mind
hearing it the way I interpreted it one day on an electric piano using the
'vibes' setting.

In the 17th century, classical music was not yet focused on stricter forms
or tonal centers.  Pieces by Frescobaldi, Froberger et al were a bit more
rambling in nature, Frescobaldi especially sounding like a jazzman of today
with some wild changes going on at most times.  Very kinky.  I love his
stuff.  The preludes, fantasias written by several in those times were the
most improvisatory of course.

Louis Couperin was Francois Couperin's uncle.  The unmeasured preludes he
and others wrote, which prefaced the more conventional and formal french
suites written, were interesting puzzles in that all the notes were written
as whole notes and no bar lines were given.  The interpretation was up to
the player (in this case, harpsichordists), based on the more formal
preludes written out at that time.

The one I have at my mp3.com site is played on a touch-sensitive electric
piano using the "vibes" setting for its more bell-like melodic notes though
one has to put up with a non-authentic vibrato!  as well as a boomy and
undefined bass.  But I think the writing of these is interesting and
thought non-early-music types not familiar with this music might find it
intriguing.

The vibes choice might be said to trivialize the music.  No doubt.  You
lose the special intervals we tune in, on harpsichord, for another thing.
However, the upper sounds -are- closer to the harpsichord sound, actually,
than the duller electric piano's sound.  My harpsichord is now dilapidated
from neglect as I went back to piano and didn't keep it up.

Since people on this forum seem to have a wide range of musical interests,
I'm curious to hear from any who might listen to it, to see if it is at all
like what they'd expect from classical music from the 17th century.

The vibes setting doesn't change the progressions as written.  And if you
play the music yourself, slowly, via the sheet music I link people to, it's
almost inevitable - from the bass-note lines - what happens in the piece.

Whether played on the harpsichord or on this electric piano on a quite
weird setting, it is still unusual to hear, but strangest of all, it sounds
as if it were written today, more modern than pieces in the primary Baroque
period, certainly.

I've often wondered what more people would think of this earlier music if
they heard it (the radios don't play music from this period, usually only
pre- or post-17th century, except for the more conventional later Purcell
they might find).

   This is at http://mp3.com/andrys/

"Lo-fi" buttons are for normal modem-users, and "Hi-fi" buttons are for
those on DSL, cablemodem, or fast lans at work.

The added details about the piece can be read there if you click on the
Title-link for the Couperin piece (the last piece on the page).  And there
are also links (at the top of the page) to the sheet music images, stored
on my own server.  It's much more interesting to see the sheet music while
listening.

Apologies for the other (piano) music there which is played on an old dull
spinet, but it's all I have.

Unfortunately, the Couperin piece is not tonally adventurous in the way
that Frescobaldi is.  I do recommend Bob van Asperen's CD set for the
Frescobaldi books.  And Leonhardt for the organ versions.  I haven't heard
Alessandrini yet but plan to.

For Louis Couperin, I recommend Leonhardt's wonderful album as well as
Katherine Roberts' if you can find it.  She lives here and I introduced her
to the Louis Couperin unmeasured prelude in C, #9, and she played it for
her CD, which then won a nomination in France for best Baroque recording of
the year, very unusual for the French to nominate a U.S.  recording.

Henry Purcell, at the age of 21, wrote Fantasias for viols (more
adventurous than some of his later music) and I played an early 60s
recording of these by Harnoncourt's group, for a modern woodwinds person
who who's won awards for his recordings.  He was amazed that these sounded
like modern blues.  (He was even more amazed by a Gesualdo lament.) If
anyone's interested in that, find the recording by Harnoncourt now at
Musical Heritage, or try the one by Jordi Savall.

Andrys
http://andrys.com
http://mp3.com/andrys/