L'Amphion Anglicus de John Blow : anglicismes et cosmopolitismes musicaux à l’orée du XVIIIème siècle

Résumé En

John Blow (1649-1708) was an essentially religious composer, except for his opera Venus and Adonis and several odes and occasional vocal pieces such as his famous Ode on the Death of Mr. Henry Purcell. Although Amphion Anglicus was not so successful, it is all the same fundamentally interesting. The number of voices and duration of the piece cannot but call to mind the «airs de cour » written in France during the previous fifty years. The themes of numerous pieces belong to the same tradition as antique pastoral poetry, such as it is exemplified in the works of the French «précieux » poets and of some Italian ones. Transparent minuet patterns can recall simple French dance songs, while some instrumental ensembles are reminiscent of Italian trio sonatas. But if such influences are inevitable, a genuinly British idiom is nevertheless largely relevant in most pieces. The poems given by his friends, in the introduction, together with the various texts set to music in the book are tokens of a definite nationalism — not to say ‘ chauvinisme ’ — typical of a certain Englishness. But most of all, it is in the general conception of the book and above all in the free, almost rhapsodic declamation that a highly original style is revealed, possibly derived from a certain kind of Italian recitative, but at all events wonderfully matching the English language and wit.