Robert Peters: >I love this piece by Couperin. But I am puzzled by its name. Can anyone >enlighten me? "The 'mysterious' part of the title we can comprehend - what are les barricades?. We will never really know what Couperin had in mind or whether, two centuries befor Satie, he was making fun of the world - and this in a piece already laden with contradictions. In contrast to the twitterings of Le Gazouillement, this solemn piece is concentrated in the register that subdues the characteristic metallic brilliance of the harpsichord while accentuating its profound and serious nature, its expansive, tender quality. This range in often used on Couperin's pieces [...]; one searches in vain among the works of his contemporaries for a similar display of a uniformly low-pitched tone colour. The lute style, rarely employed so systematically, allows the polyphony to project. There are four voices, without a single note sounding at the same time as another - creating a liquified polyphony that dissolves and spreads out like a smooth, viscous batter." Philippe Beaussant, Francios Couperin, Amadeus Press 1990 Dave Hardman, Canberra, Australia